^ 



HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 



or 



GRAND LAKE STREAM 
PLANTATION 



^ 






Hinckley Township 

or 

Grand Lake Stream 
Plantation 



A Sketch by 

MINNIE ATKINSON 



Pt in ted by the 

NEWBURYPORT HERALD PRESS 

Newburyport, Massachusetts 






Copyright 1920 

by 

MINNIE ATKINSON 

Published 

December 1920 



DEC -6 1920 



g)CU60l820 



To my Uncle 
FRED L. ATKINSON 

in whose camp 

ai 

Grand Lake Stream 

1 have spent many 
pleasant months 



ACKNOWLEDGMENT AND FOREWORD 

For the information contained in these pages thanks are 
due and gratefully given to Mr. and Mrs Arthur Wheaton, 
Mr. W. B. Hoar, Mr. Truman Brown, Mr. David Welch, 
Mr. W. G. Rose, Mrs. Thomas Calligan, Mr. and Mrs Wil- 
liam Gollln, Mr. and Mrs James Sprague, Mrs Frank Hol- 
mes, Mr. Frederick Foster, Mr. John Story, Mr. Stephen 
Sprague, Mr. Stephen Yates, Mrs. Augustine Mc Donald, Mr 
Charles Calligan, Mrs. Jackson Brown, Mr. Abraham Mc- 
Arthur, Mrs. Alonzo Woodward, Mrs. Ellen Hawkins and 
many others of Grand Lake Stream, to Mrs Martha Gould 
of Township 27, to Louis Mitchel of Pleasant Point and to 
Joe Mitchel of Peter Dana's Point. Mr. Charles A Rolfe of 
Princeton has been especially kind in furnishing much val- 
uable information in regard to the Princeton and Milford 
road, early sportsmen and other matters. Messrs. Joshua 
Crockett, William Robinson and Orington Brown, life long 
residents of Princeton and its vicinity, the first two kvith 
memories reaching back nearly eighty years, have given val- 
uable information of lumbering, lumber firms and pioneers 
of Hinckley. Mr. John Gardner of Calais has furnished some 
interesting facts. To Mr. Wallace Brown of the latter city 
thanks are due for several Indian stories and the Indian my- 
thology. Mr. James Vroom of St. Stephen has also contri- 
buted information. In addition to his report in various num- 
bers of the "Report of the United States Fish Commissioner,* 
from which extracts have been freely made, Mr. Charles G. 
Atkins of Bucksport has furnished data of the earliest fish 
cultural work in the village. Mr. C. J. Webber of Bangor has 
given VcJuable information from the records in his office and 
Miss Alice R. Farnum, first assistant in the Massachusetts 
Archives Department, has given aid in the search of old re- 
cords. The Land Office in Augusta has been most court- 
eous in answering many letters of inquiry. 

Information has been gathered from many sources in 



addition to those mentioned. It has often come from 
chance conversations and from desultory reading. It would 
be impossible to trace all its sources, but an earnest effort 
has been made to weave it all into a true story of Hinckley 
Township. 

To the people of Grand Lake Stream who have patient- 
ly told me their unwritten annals I wish to say that my best 
hope of the history is that it will express somewhat of the 
deep regard I have for them, and perhaps in some measure 
repay their trouble in its behalf. I am conscious that it will 
fall short of expectations. Despite vigilance there will be 
almost certainly inaccuracies and omissions. It is with many 
misgivings that it is at length sent to the printer. 

This remote Township may seem to the casual visitor 
like one of the spare ends of our country, too little devel- 
oped to be important or interesting, too sparcely populat- 
ed to need depicting. My manuscript has grown, neverthe- 
less, breaking from the original thought of what it should be 
(the entertainment of a few idle weeks) and taking an un- 
expected shape, and length and much time in its prepara- 
tion. The work has been extremely interesting. 

Here, when white men first came, was a sort of inverted 
Nirvana where all was change yet nothing changed: years 
passed but brought no age; countless generations of trees, 
beasts, birds and fishes lived and died — all indistinguish- 
able one from another. One year was every year. Winds, 
lightenings, rain and frost worked havoc but altered nothing. 
Life, prolific, strong and rapacious, gained nothing. Indians 
snatched a scanty sustenance from land and water but arrest- 
ed none of the savage inertia, nor wrought changes in them- 
selves. No living thing here sought variation, or looked 
backward or forward. Nature's goal was forgotten, aband- 
oned or reached. Life, decay, litter, and again life, decay, 
litter unending, always the same. 

From the time of the De Monts settlement in 1 604 on an 
island near the mouth of the St. Croix river white men occa- 
sionally penetrated into these wilds. Trappers, hunters, ex- 
plorers, adventurers, men from the fort of La Tour on the 
St. John river and from the Seigniory of the Baron de la 
Castine on the Penobscot river sometimes passed along 



these lakes and carries. A Jesuit priest in his sable robes 
may have brought a passing touch of deeper gloom. As 
the eighteenth century neeired its end soldiers of the Re- 
volution and then surveyors came here also. These were 
portends of events to come. They left no marks. Early 
in the nineteenth century lumbermen began to operate in 
the vicinity. Then a new force, human wills seeking a de- 
finite end, began the rout of savagery. A slow, uncertain 
but actual march of events began. 

Thus was ushered here the courageous, picturesque, ad- 
venturous, hale human life that took root and thrived. The 
pioneers, the rude epic of the tannery, the play of sportsmen 
are all acts in a drama whose plot lis the maintenance of life 
under difficulties. This history can do little to reveal the 
struggle, or the joy, sorrow and unconscious faith that has 
attended it, but perhaps the facts here set down will awaken 
the imagination of readers and thus be a medium to convey 
understanding of it. 

Newbur3rport, Massachusetts. 



CONTENTS 

Mythology Passamaquoddy Tribe 

Chapter 1 Location and some Early History 

Chapter II Under the Jurisdiction of Meissachusetts, Logging 

Chapter III Squatters, Sportsmen, First Road 

Chapter IV The Tannery 

Chapter V The Village 

Chapter VI Lakenwild 

Chapter VII The Tannery Concluded 

Chapter VIII Hinckley Township becomes Grand Lake 
Stream Plantation 

Chapter IX Later Days in the Village 

Chapter X Grand Lake Streeim in the World War 

Chapter XI Description of the Village 

Chapter XII Fish and Game 

Chapter XIII The Hatchery 

Chapter XIV Later Indians 

Chapter XV The Sewing Circle, The Church 

Chapter XVI Witteguergaugum 

Appendix Poems, Indian Names, Demons and Stories 



ILLUSTRATIONS 

Looking at the village from Indian Hill Frontispiece 

The Stream below Big Falls 

The Saw Mill 

The Dam 

Grand Lake Hotel 

The School House 

Boynton's Camps 

Treadwell's Camps ' 

Ball's Camps 

Fishing from a Pier 

The Stream and Second Hatchery 

The Church 



Mythology of the Passeunaquoddy Indians 



In the beginning, used to say the Indians, KIooscup, the 
first man, formed all things. All the animals then were of 
the same size. The lively flea jumped forty miles. This 
was too rapid locomotion for the best interests of all con- 
cerned. So KIooscup rubbed him down until he became 
very litde. The moose, on the other hand, was so stupid 
that he would neither do harm nor be unduly exuberant so 
he was rubbed larger. The squirrel ran up a tree so fierce- 
ly that he tore it down. He was lubbed smaller. Thus 
KIooscup rubbed everything larger or smaller according 
to the nature which it displayed. The trees were next 
formed, and the ash tree made king of them all. KIooscup 
stuck a great many bows and arrows into it, and present- 
ly out came men and women. 

There was an old witch, called Poochinquis, who used 
to go up and down the forests crying; "I want your babies! 
I kill babies!" KIooscup caught her, cut her up in pieces, 
and threw the pieces into the water. Out of these pieces 
came the mosquitoes, the flies and all the bad insectsv with 
the exception, of course, of the fleas. 

Thus the world was made ready for the needs and story 
of human life. 



HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 
or Grand Lake Stream Plantation 

Chapter I 
Location of Township and some of its Early History 



Almost in the center of the old Passamaquoddy land 
lay a tangled chain of lakes and streams like trinkets of sil- 
ver on the deep green of the earth. Largest of all the lakes 
was Witteguergaugum, now called Grand lake and next 
largest was Genesagenagum, renamed Big lake. Between 
these two and projecting broadly to the east and north was 
the wilderness that became Hinckley Township. Into Grand 
lake the water of thirty-two other lakes and ponds flows.* 
Three streams empty it into Big lake, thence through Long 
and Lewey lakes and by way of the St. Croix river the water 
flows to Passamaquoddy bay. The largest and middle of 
these streams is Grand lake stream. It has two water falls 
and is full of little rips. Nearly all of it is within the borders 
of Hinckley. It is three miles long, and runs almost diagon- 
ally across its southwestern corner. Bonney brook, the 
easterly stream of the three, is entirely therein. The third 
outlet, Litde river, lies in the Township to the west which is 
Number 6, Range 1. The southern extremity and an east- 
ern cove of Grand lake, and the northwestern part of Big 
lake are in Hinckley. 

The chief settlement of the ancient Passamaquoddy 
tribe (once called Sabbayk and by the French classed with 
the Penobscot and Micmack Indians as Etchemins) was near 
the bay, but members of the tribe made frequent migrations 



*The lakes and ponds flowing into Grand lake are Pocumpas?, 
Warbash, Sistadobsis (Dobsis) Upper Sistadobsis, Junior, Scragley, 
Pleasant, Shaw, Horseshoe, Bottle, Keg, Norway, Pug (flowing into 
Junior bay of Grand lake) Pug (flowing in Dobsis) Duck, Mill Privi- 
lege, Pond, Lumbert, Lowell, Glaspy, Hasty Cove. Pickerel, Trout, 
McClellen Brook, Whitney Cove, 1st Ox Brook, 2nd Qx Brook, Dyer 
Cove, Killborn, 1st, 2nd and 3rd Chain lakes. 



2 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

up into this region. Sometimes as many as twenty families 
would paddle up through the lakes, one family in a canoe, 
one canoe behind another — a long, silent, single line. 
When the travelers reached the bead of Big lake — if they 
were going still further — they would carry the canoes, in- 
verted over the heads and resting on the shoulders of the 
men, along the east bank of Grand lake stream to Grand 
lake. An Indian carry, so much used that even the rocks 
are worn, was thus made across the corner of the Township. 
Favorite cemiping places were upon the west bank of the 
stream near Grand lake and upon the lower eastern shores 
of the lakei In the former place many Indian relics have 
been found. Sometimes the Indians pushed to the head 
w^aters of Grand, or to the further laikes. In the Autumn 
and Winter these trips were hunting expeditions. When 
deer were sought the hunters, epuipped with snow shoes, 
skimmed over the snow easily in the chase, but the deer sank 
through the snow, were speedily exhausted and easily killed 
with clubs. Often wolves would come down from the north- 
ern forests, and drive away the deer for many seeisons. At 
such times the tribe would suffer from hunger. The mi- 
grations in the spring, in later times, were often for the pur- 
pose of making sugar. 

Sometimes Mohawks made incursions into the Pas- 
samaquoddy land and attacked these peaceful camping 
parties. At the head of Grand lake is a narrows which 
connects it with Pocumpass lake. It is called "The Thor- 
oughfare." Fragments of a tradition tell of an attack by 
Mohawks upon a party of Passamaquoddies at this point. 
A number of Indian graves on the east shore are said to 
contain the bodies of warriors who fell in the battle. Many 
arrow heads and other weapons are still found about the 
spot. 
The story of the battle runs thus: 

When the terrifying cry of the Mohawks rang through 
the woods the surprised Passamaquoddies defended them- 
selves desperately. So fierce was the ensuing onset that 
a brook, trickling into the lake in the midst of it, ran red and 



LOCATION AND EARLY HISTORY 3 

thus received a baptism of blood, and a christening for it has 
since been called Blood brook. With the coming of dark- 
ness the din and slaughter of battle halted. In the night the 
remaining remnants of Passamaquoddies fled in canoes 
down the lakes to a point on Big lake called Peter Dana's 
Point in honor of one of the more notable chiefs, or gover- 
nors of the tribe. The Mohawks had no canoes. The fugi- 
tives hoped they could not follow. Nevertheless lookouts 
were stationed on high land and in the tops of trees. A 
day of anxiety wore on. Late in the afternoon there was 
a cry of alarm. Above the tops of the trees on the west 
side of Grand lake a flurry of dead leaves rose in an om- 
inous and advancing cloud. TTie sign was easlTy read. 
The Mohawks were coming and so rapidly that the wind 
of their passage drove the leaves upward. The Passama- 
quoddies took to their canoes and disappeared from the 
spot, hurrying to one of the remote recesses of this remark 
able and intricate system of lakes and streams where the 
Mohawks could not find them.* 

Another and still more fragmentary tradition tells of 
the final combat in the warfare with Mohawks. This ver- 
sion of it was told some time ago by Nicholas Lola, a chief 
of the tribe, to one of his white friends. Indians of a for- 
mer generation were fond of telling these traditions and 
would become very excited in the recital. 

This fight began at Loon bay on the St. Croix river, and 
showed excellent generalship on the part of the Passama- 
quoddies — if the manoeuvre w^as not incited by some ad- 
venturous white man, probably a Frenchman. A few 
fighters were placed in advance of the main body of Indians. 
ThettV duty was to fall back and entice 'the Mohawks to fol- 
low them. The main body of Passamaquoddies also con- 
stantly fell back, the taunting savages in front' of them 
drawing the Mohawks on. 

"They go back and back," said Nicholas Lola. "They 

*In an artirle entitled "The Abanaki Indians", Frederick Kidder 
attributes the historical obscurity of this tribe -oartly to the water' 
ways of their territory which afforded many and safe hiding places. 
"Collections of Maine Historical Society", Vol. VI. 



4 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

all go back to narrow part of Grand lake and there we 
fightl" 

To stimulate the warriors to frantic enthusiasm just be- 
fore the final battle the Medicine Man of the tribe dressed 
himself in a bear skin. Going a little in advance of the 
army he told |them to shoot arrows at him. If he turned 
and came back to them it would be a sign that they would 
be defeated in the battle, but if he went toward the enemy 
they were to follow and they would win. 

"That fellow," said Nicholas Lola, "he look just like a 
bear. We shoot arrows: he run forward and we lick 'em 
good!" 

Although no dates are attached to these stories, if the 
events are historical, they probably occured more than two 
hundred and fifty years ago when Mohawks terrorized so 
many white settlers and Indian tribes in eastern Canada and 
northern New England. 

After the discovery of America this north eastern part 
of the continent fell into the possession of the French. Jes- 
uit Missions were established in eastern Maine, Nova Scotia 
and Canada, and the Indian owners of Hinckley soon be- 
came converts to the Catholic faith. When the English 
obtained possession of the strip of land between the Pen- 
obscot and St. Croix rivers, in the early part of the seven^- 
teenth century, it, like the rest of Maine, was annexed to the 
Massachusetts Bay Colony. The Indians here helped some- 
what »n the war made on settlers who early pushed as far 
east as the Kennebec river. They took an active part in the 
Revolutionary War on the American side. Washington 
was held in almost sacred esteem by them. He sent letters 
to each of three tribes of the vicinity — the Penobscot, the 
Passamaquoddy and the St. John — exorting them to faith- 
fulness in the American cause. The Passamaquoddy tribe 
still treasures its letter.* Delegates of these three tribes 
went to Watertown to meet the Massachusetts Council. 
Through their spokesman, Ambrose St. Aubin, chief of the 

*Thi8 letter is in possession of the Pleasant Point branch of the 
tribe. 



LOCATION AND EARLY HISTORY 5 

St. Johns, they promised to adhere to the American cause, 
but asked in return a favor. 

*"We want," said St. Aubin, "a black gown, or French 
priest. Jesus we pray to: and we will not hear any pray 
ers from Old England." 

So carefully had Massachusetts put up barriers agalinst 
Catholics that it was sometime before a priest was procured 
for them. 

**Col. John Allan was "Superintendent of Indian affairs 
in the Eastern Department and Commander of the Port of 
Machias." The Indians were greatly attached to him. An 
account of their activities during this war belongs to the his- 
tory of Machias, but it is pertinent to say that if they had not 
been zealous assistants in the defence of that place all of the 
territory east of the Penobscot river would have been lost to 
Maine. Notwithstanding the "artful guiles of the enemy" 
to win their help they did, with very few exceptions, remain 
faithful to the American cause. 

The old Indian routes — one starting at the Passama- 
quoddy bay and following the western branch of the St. 
Croix river, the other starting from Machias and following 
the Machids river and short portage to Big lake — over these 
lakes and carries to the Passadumkeag river were the inland 
routes to the Penobscot river. They were constantly used 
during the war. Col. Allan sometimes sent his despatches 
this w^ay and thus westward to Massachusetts. Once very 
important ones were captured on the Penobscot river by 
British agents. Col. Allan himself was nearly captured on 
one of these lakes. He was traveling on skates when "he 
was set upon by a party of Indians in the service of the 
British, also mounted on skates. They gave chase and 
closely pressed him for a mile or two, w^hen coming to an 
open place, a channel of water, he gave a tremendous jump 
and landed safely on the other side." 

*"Hi8torical Magazine," July 1869. 

**This information pertaining to Col. John Allan and the Indians 
is nearlv all taken from a book compiled from the Journals and let- 
ters of Col Allan by Frederick Kidder, called: "Military Operations 
in Eastern Maine and Nova Scotia during the Revolution." Publish- 
ed 1867. 



6 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

On a spot near the Grand lake stream carry there is a 
lonely grave where a soldier, possibly of this war, was bur- 
ied. Whether he was American or British is not known.* 
From Eastport upward along the west bank of the Passama- 
quoddy bay are many graves of Indians who fell defending 
this eastern territory. 

In 1 793 Col. Allan writes in his report on the Indian 
tribes: "On the lakes you will find numbers of Indians from 
Canada, St. Johns, Penobscot and the Mickmack Country, 
pesuing their several employments agreeable to the seasons. 
Some constant residents, and many of them for years not 
seen on the sea coast, being perpetually on the move." 

The Indian owners of Hinckley also took part in the War 
of 1812. There are traditions that some of the command 
of John Brewer, Brigadier General of Militia in Washington 
County, came up through the Township over the old carry. 

A few years ago, near this carry, a copper coin was 
found which was dated 1 776. On one side was a likeness 
of George the third, on the other an effigy of an Indian on 
a prancing horse. The Indian's right arm was upraised, and 
in his hand a long spear was poised. Near the feet of the 
horse was a coiled rattlesnake with its head uplifted. The 
coin was about the size of a Canadian penny, and had a hole 
in it. It had evidently Iain in the ground a long time. It 
may have been dropped by fei soldier of one of these two 
wars, or, it is surmised, it may have been struck as a medal 
for the Indians, and been dropped by one of them. 

When in the last months of the War of 1812 the Eng- 
lish troops held all the land east of the Penobscot river and 
administered the civil government from Bangor, the Indians 
did, for a short time, once more fall under the sway of the 
disliked England. England proposed to make of this con- 
guest a separate province of the Canadian government, and 
to call it New Ireland. When the Peace of Ghent was 
signed, however, Hinckley and the rest of eastern Maine 
were once more saved to the United States. 

*It was probably an Englishman buried here since an American 
would almost certainly have been carried to Machias for burial. See 
verses in the Appendix. 



^NDER JURISDICTION OF MASS., LOGGING 7 

CHAPTER II 
Under the Jurisdiction of Massachusetts 
and Logging 

The Massachusetts Bay Colony seems to have given 
litrie attention to her lands beyond the Penobscot river. 
They were inhabited by hostile Indians and "renegade 
Frenchmen." Of the latter there were but few, and in an 
act, passed in 1721, to prohibit trade or commerce of any 
sort with the Indians the Bay Colony makes no mention of 
them. The following section of the act shows how deter- 
mined she was to stamp out all intercourse. "That whoever 
shall, after the first day of October next, directly or indirect- 
ly have any trade or commerce by way of gift, barter or ex- 
change, or any way whatsoever, with any of the aforesaid 
Indians, or shall supply them with any provisions, clothing, 
guns, powder, shot, bullets or any goods, wares or mer- 
chandise whatsoever shall forfeit and pay the sum of five 
hundred pounds, and suffer twelve months imprisonment 
w/thout bail or main prize, upon the first conviction; the 
said forfeiture to be recovered by bill, plaint or information 
in any of his majesty's courts of record — one half to him, or 
them, who shall inform and sue for same." Upon a second 
conviction an offender against this law was to be "deemed 
a felon and suffer the pangs of death." 

A few settlements w^ere made in the interior of eastern 
Maine ptior to the Revolutionary v/ar, but there are no ob- 
tainable records to show whether or not there were any with- 
in the limits of the tract later to be called Hinckley. It seems 
as if somebody must have migrated into these forests ver^-" 
early for in the deed w^hich Massachusetts later gave of the 
Township she makes provision for the rights of settlers who 
were here before 1 784. 

This Township, though near, w^as not included in the 
million acres of land set aside for lottery prizes by means of 
which, shortly after the Revolutionary war, Massachusetts 
undertook to raise revenue for her exhausted trc? "nrv. 



8 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

When the lottery lands practically all passed to William 
Bingham of Philadelphia a rather curious thing happened. 
According to a paper found among those of Mr. John 
Gardner, for fifty years a surveyor in this region, the lottery 
land, as originally surveyed, fell a little short of the million 
acres. In order to give Mr. Bingham the full amount of his 
purchase an additional strip, two miles wide and thirty six 
miles long, was surveyed and conveyed to him. Such a 
strip is marked on a very old map preserved in the Massa- 
chusetts archives, but it stretches across the tops of six 
Townships west of Hinckley. They are in the same line, 
however, and doubtless when in 1 794 Samuel Titcomb sur- 
veyed and marked off the Townships of Washington Coun- 
ty he made those of Range One, in which Hinckley is Num- 
ber Three, the unusual distance of eight miles from the north 
ern to the southern limits in order to conform with this line. 
At all events the Townships of this range are eight miles in 
extent north and south and six miles east and west. 

In the same year that Washington County was surveyed, 
and it-5 gloomy forests niarked by invisible lines into named 
tracts, Massachusetts made a treaty with the Indians. Town 
ship Tw^o, just east of Hinckley, was set aside for them, and 
much other land in this vicinity. In Township Three one 
hundred acres of land on the end of a point that extends 
into Big lake, and also Pine island, the northern part of 
which is in the Township, were reserved for them. The 
point is, on some old records preserved in the State House 
in Boston, called Nemcass. It is now usually called Gover- 
nor's point because several Indian chiefs, or, as they are now 
called, Governors, have resided there. 

The treaty with the Indians established for them the 
"privilege of fishing on both branches of the River Schood- 
ic" (the St. Croix river)" without Hinderance or Molesta- 
tion, and the privilege of passing the said river over the dif- 
ferent Carrying Places thereon." 

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts was now ready to 
dispose of her Townships in this part of the District of 
Maine, and anxious to have them settled. Township Three, 



UNDER JURISDICTION OF MASS., LOGGING 9 

Range One, was contracted for by Titus Goodman and 
Seth Wright in 1 794. There seems to be no further record 
of Mr. Wright's connection with the contract. It was Titus 
Goodman who promised to pay the Commonwealth 2905 
pounds, 1 8 shillings and 9 pence for these many acres of 
woodland. According to the crumbling "Report of the 
Commissioners for the Sale of Eastern Lands on June 1 6th, 
1795," Goodman paid 207 pounds of this sum, and gave 
his note for 2698 pounds, 18 shillings and 9 pence. He 
w^as a son of Captain Noah Goodman, a political leader of 
South Hadley. Close by in Northampton lived Samuel 
Hinckley, a judge of the Probate Court and an owner of var- 
ious townships, one of them being what is now Rochester, 
N. Y. When, either because of financial embarrassment, 
or for other reasons, Goodman did not pay this note Judge 
Hinckley as his assignee, paid into the treasury of the Com- 
monwealth the money due on the purchase, by that time 
computed in dollars and cents, and became the proprietor 
of the Township. If the amount of Goodman's note equall- 
ed the $90 1 9.80 w^hich Judge Hinckley paid then a pound in 
those days must have equalled in our money about $3.34. 
Thus the price originally paid for the Township approximat- 
ed $97 IL 18. It became known as Hinckley. The follow- 
ing is a copy of the deed as preserved in the State House 
of Massachusetts. 

"Know all Men by these Presents: 
"That we, whose names are undersigned, and such of- 
ficers appointed agents by the General Court of the Com- 
monwealth of Massachusetts to make and to execute con- 
veyances agreeably to a resolve as passed the fifteenth day 
of March 1805, and by virtue of other powers vested in us 
by the same resolve: For and in consideration of $90 1 9.80 
paid into the treasury of the Commonwealth have given, 
granted, sold and conveyed, by these same presents in be- 
half of the Commonwealth do give, grant, sell and convey 
unto Samuel Hinckley esquire of Northampton, in the Coun- 
ty of Hampshire and Commonwealth aforesaid, assignee of 
Titus Goodman and Seth Wright, a township of lancT lylz)'?: 



10 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

in the county of Washington and Commonwealth aforesaid 
containing thirty thousand, seven hundred and seventy acres 
to the same, more or less, the said township being numbered 
three in the first range of Townships lying west of the Pas- 
samaquoddy river as the same was surveyed by Samuel 
Titcomb in the year 1 794 — said township was originally 
contracted for by said Goodman on the second day of 
March 1 795, bounded as follows., viz: northerly by number 
three in second range, easterly by number two !n same 
range, southerly by township owned by William Bingham 
and westerly by the line run by Maynard and Holland, ex- 
cepting and reserving, however, about three thousand acres 
in the easterly corner of the township first mentioned, and 
in the southerly corner thereof, bounded as follows, viz: 
Beginning on the southerly side of the township first men- 
tioned and on the westerly side of the lake therein, thence 
funning northeasterly to the northwesternmost part of 
Pine Island (so called) then southeasterly in- 
cluding said island to the northwesterly corner of the one 
hundred acres of land conveyed to the Indians, then north- 
easterly by the land last mentioned to the east line of the 
township first mentioned then south to the southeast corner 
thereof, then w^est to the westerly side of said 
lake the place of beginning, and also reserving in said town- 
ship four lots bf three hundred and twenty acres each for 
public uses viz., one lot for the first settled minister his heirs 
and assigns, one lot for the use of the ministry, one lot for 
the use of schools, and one lot for the future appropriation of 
the General Court, the said lots to average in situation and 
quality with the other lands in said township. To have 
and to hold the aforesaid premises to him, the said Samuel 
Hinckley his heirs and assigns forever on condition that the 
said Samuel Hinckley his heirs and assigns shall grant and 
convey unto each settler in said tow^nship who settled there- 
in before the first day of January 1 784 or in case of assign- 
ment then to the assigns. One hundred acres of land to be 
laid out as will best include the improvements of the settler 
and be least injurious to the adjoining lands so that the set- 



UNDER JURISDICTION OF MASS.. LOGGING 1 1 

tier, his heirs or assigns may hold the same in fee simple 
provided that the settler his heirs or assigns shall within one 
year after notice and request pay to the said Samuel Hinck- 
ley his heirs or assigns, five dollars and on this further con- 
dition that the conditions of settlement contained in said 
contract shall have been complied with which were as fol- 
lows, viz., "that the said Titus Goodman shall settle in said 
township number three twenty families within four years, 
and twenty families more within eight years from the date 
hereof," and the said agents covenant with the said Samuel 
Hinckley that the said Commonwealth shall warrant and 
defend the aforementioned premises on the conditions and 
saving the reservations aforementioned to him, his heirs 
and assigns forever. 

In witness thereof we have hereunto set our hands and 
seals this seventh day of February, 1811. 
Signed, sealed and delivered in presence of: 
George W. Coffin John Reed 

Charles Davis William Smith 

Suffolk, Boston, February 7th, 1811 
Acknowledged before Charles Davis 
' ' Justice of the Peace." 

It is not known what efforts the first proprietor of Hinck- 
ley made to induce forty families to settle in the Township, 
but there is no doubt about the failure of such an accom- 
plishment. Massachusetts made a similiar provision for 
the settlement of the new townships in many of the deeds 
which she gave of them. *Very generally in eastern Maine 
these contracts were not fulfilled — partly because a sufficient 
number of emigrants could not be found, and partly be- 
cause in some casses the land was inaccessable. Hinckley, or 
at least the southeastern corner of it, was very accessable 
by way of the lakes, or west branch of the St. Croix river. 
In 1820, or thereabout, David Cass brought his family and 
settled in this corner, land possibly at about the same time 

*"A Statistical View of the District of Maine", by Moses Green- 
leaf, Esq. 1816. 



12 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

Baxter Smith and his family made a stay of a very few years. 
Both of these settlements were upon the three thousand 
acres reserved by Massachusetts. 

This reservation was sold to William Vance of Baring 
in 182 7. On November 1st, 1832, Mr. Vance sold it to 
Charles Peavy, and it has since been called Peavy Gore. 
In 1827 Massachusetts sold the lot of thjree hundred and 
twenty acres, reserved for the use of the General Court, to 
Judge Hinckley. In 1835 Mr. Hinckley sold the Township 
to Colonel Nehemiah Marks of St. Stephen. Marks was 
the son of a loyalist of Revolutionary days. Prior to that 
War the family lived in Darby, Connecticut, but it went to 
New Brunswick in the general exodus of loyalists. Neither 
Colonel Marks nor Judge Hinckley actively engaged in lum- 
bering in this Township. It is doubtful if the latter eVer 
even visited it. 

The Township eventually passed to Colonel Marks' heirs 
and from them to the following gentlemen: Thomas J. 
Copeland, William Duren, Henry C. Copeland, Enos D. 
Sawyer, John G. Murchie, James Murchie, George A. Board- 
man and Charles F. Todd. These in turn became granters 
of it to F. Shaw and Brothers on August 4th, 1 870. 

Pioneering languished, but the business of log cutting 
prospered. In 1810a dam was built across the stream by 
Alden Trott of Baring. It was placed about ten rods be- 
low the present dam. Since that time great quantities of 
logs have been driven through it each spring. Many of 
them have been cut from the forests about Hinckley, but the 
trees here have not been spared. On Bonney brook many 
logs were floated. Ninety years ago, says a tradition, 
"Natty" Lamb, lumber contractor engaged by the Todd 
Lumber Company of Calais, drove thousands of feet of 
lumber through it. The Musquash river and its branches. 
East Branch, West Branch and Amazon, were also used al- 
though they have little current. Thus there were compara- 
tively few places in the Township from which logs, with 
reasonable convenience, could not be removed. TTiey pas- 
sed down through the lakes, or west branch of the St. Croix 



UNDER JURISDICTION OF MASS., LOGGING 1 3 

river, to Milltown, and thence, as lumber, to many markets 
both in America and Europe. 

These early lumber camps were built of logs. The roof 
was of cedar splits and slanted somewhat, usually toward the 
south, to shed the rain and snow. In the middle of it was 
a hole about four feet square which was funnelled up for 
four or five feet with small logs or branch wood, and cov- 
ered on the inside with clay. Under it, on the ground, the 
fire was built. In the evenings after supper the crew sat or 
sprawled around the fire to enjoy its leisure. Somebody 
was always the butt of a joke that was not allowed to lan- 
guish until a new one arose. Nearly every happening in 
the few pioneer families within a dozen mileat was of interest 
and in some magic way known. Many strange things oc- 
curred in the woods. Despite a robust common sense pulses 
were quickened, eyes distended by a recital of them. There 
were accounts of experiences with bears, wolves, moose, 
bobcats, muskrats, beavers, skunks and many other animals 
for unfailing interest. There was also, unfortunately, plen- 
ty of whiskey. Dominos was a favorite game; cards was a 
prime favorite but little indulged in because it too often led 
to quarrelling. Each camp was in charge of a cook who 
endeavored to maintain order. If he did not succeed he 
quickly gave way to a successor. The crews were for the 
most part composed of men from families of early settlers 
in eastern Maine. Sometimes there were a few Indians 
among, them, and white strangers sometimes joined them 
for longer or shorter periods whose antecedents were only 
surmised. A Frenchman with a violin was often one of the 
camp inmates. Jigs and reels then sent their cheerful 
strains out through chinks and broad funnel to the somber, 
lonesomeness of the frozen forests while inside the camp the 
music spirited away the fatigue of the day so that men rose 
on nimble feet and in the narrow spaces around the fire 
danced clogs and jigs and double shuffles and every sort of 
clever step that native genius could devise. Against the 
bunks and log walls distorted shadows kept pace with the 
revel. 



14 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

When the early bed time came the men lay with their 
feet to the blaze. Those who were wakeful could look 
up through the log funnel to the stars. In bad weather the 
fire sputtered with rain or snow that fell into it. 

Sometimes there were no clocks in the camps. The men 
arose when the cook called them. The usual rising time was 
four o'clock, but it occasionally happened that a mistake 
was made and the men were aroused an hour or two earlier. 
Such an incident was too unpopular to happen often. 
Breakfast consisted of pork, fish and hot bread. The latter 
was made of wheat flour, sour yeast and warm water, and 
w^as a delicacy that old wood choppers still speak of with 
deep appreciation. Dunderfunk wi^s a favorite dinner 
dish. It was made of bread and pork cut in small pieces^ 
mixed with molasses and baked in a bake kettle in the 
ground. Studjo was also liked. That was made of rabbit, 
venison or any fresh meat procurable and potatoes, and 
cooked like a stew. The early camps had no onions to fla- 
vor such dishes. The camps were hospitable places. Any 
man traveling about the woods on any business whatso- 
ever — lumber prospector, wood chopper looking for work, a 
chance fugitive from justice, a mere restless ne'erdowell — al- 
ways expected to be entertained and was almost never disa- 
pointed. No matter at what time a traveler appeared he 
was invited by the cook to at least share the next meal. It 
was not good manners to decline. If by any chance the in- 
vitation was not given the traveler hastened to the next camp 
and there related of the inhospitable cook: 
"He never saw I had a mouth I" 

The camps were often poorly supplied with dishes. 
Sometimes several men would eat from one frying pan; 
sometimes wooden dishes were fashioned and used. 

^Hazing was practiced upon new^ members of the crew. 
One of the favorite frolics was to prepare a bucket of soap 



*Joel Thornton, a driver of an ox team in the earliest days oP 
lumbering on the stream told his grandson, Stephen Sprague, then 
a small boy, of the hazing practices and also pf the splendid pinC' 
trees at Little falls. 



UNDER JURISDICTION OF MASS.. LOGGING 1 5 

suds and lather the face of the victim with it, using a camp 
broom, a crude affair of small branches tied together, as 
the brush. The unfortunate man was then shaved with a 
huge, wooden razor. 

The Rev. Charles Whittier, a relative of the poet, was 
a missionary visitor to early camps. He began to make his 
rounds of this section of the Maine woods about sixty years 
ago. Almost yearly since then he has visited Hinckley, and 
has witnessed the coming of many changes in the wood cut- 
ters' camps. 

The first lumbering on Grand lake stream was done near 
Little falls. Hera was a fine, first growth of pine trees, 
giants in size and unintermingled with other trees. 

Lumberling firms operating here were; J. B. Hall and 
Company, John and George Porter, Peter Avery, Peasely 
and Whitney, Burnham and Heut's, Stephen and David 
Prince, Gates and Wentworth, James Murchie , Daniel Mor- 
rison, Claudis M. Huff, Daniel Tyler. Some of the contract- 
ors were Nathaniel Lamb, Stinchfield and Waldron, Silby 
and Stinchfield, Samuel Yates, Asa Crockett, Moses Brown, 
James Coffin, Edward Cass, William Cass, David Cass, 
Mathew Sprague, Joe. Sprague, Ezra Sprague, Eli Thornton 
and Joe. Pollis. 

For shelter for the men who in the spring drove the 
logs through Grand lake stream there were three camps. 
One was placed near the dam, another at Big falls and the 
third near the mouth of the stream in Township 27. The 
dam was rebuilt from time to time. About fifty five years 
ago it was placed in its present position. In 1 873 it was al- 
most swept away by a spring freshet. 

In 1 863 a dispute arose regarding the boundary between 
Hinckley and Indian Township. The line between the two 
was resurveyed for the state of Maine by W. D. Danna. He 
established the line as it now is. All of the boundary lines 
have been remarked from time to time, but with this ex- 
ception none have been altered from the lines established by 
Samuel Titcomb in 1 794. 



16 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 



CHAPTER III 
Squatters, Sportsmen and First Road 

It was about the year 1820 that David Cass came to 
Hinckley, He was born in 1774 in Exeter, New Hampshire, 
and said he was a son of Jonathan Cass and a half brother 
of the famous Lewis Cass, *It seems to be impossible now 
to prove this claim, and equally impossible to disprove it. 
The Exeter records of those early days do not mention the 
birth of David, but they are not complete. There is no 
reason to doubt his word, since with all his faults he was not 
untruthful, Jonathan Cass, his father, was a blacksmith 
strong, restless, energetic. He won distinction in the Rev- 
olutionary war, entering it as a private and retiring a Major, 
**"He was of coal black eye and very commanding pre- 
sence," He was sent to Ohio to take command of Fort 
Hamilton in defence of the western frontier from the attacks 
of Indians, It is probable that the young David went there 
w^ith him, and there acquired at least a part of the distaste 
for Indians which he displayed here, A story survives that 
he had been guilty of some lawless act in the west and had 
fled from that wilderness to the more forbidding one of the 
extreme east to escape punishment. However that may 
have been, he had much courage, some consequence of man- 
ner and he knew how to pioneer. 

It is believed that he first landed in Maine at Oak Bay 
where he stayed for a year or more making bricks. It is 
said too that for a time he was in the Miramichi country of 
New Brunswick. In St. Stephen he met and married Ellen 
Marsh, then a sixteen years old school girl living in the fam- 
ily of Colonel Nehemiah Marks. At that time he must 
have been forty three or forty four years old. 

*McLaughlin, in his "Life of Lewis Cass", says that Jonathan 
Cass was in his twentythird year at the outbreak of the Revolution. 
In that age of early marriages it is not at all unlikely that he had al- 
ready contracted a marriage, and w^as, perhaps, a widower ■when the 
war broke out, or soon became one. His marriage to Mary Oilman, 
mother of Le'wis Cass, took place in 1778. 

**"New England Historical and Genealogical Register." 



SQUATTERS, SPORTSMEN AND FIRST ROAD 1 7 

When these two paddled up through the river and lakes 
to Hinckley they had an infant son, Edward, and a daughter, 
Mary Ann, one and a half years old. They reached the 
northern side of Big lake and settled upon a bluff overlook- 
ing the water. Their first home was a log cabin. Land 
was cleared and produce and domestic animals raised. 

The cabin in time became overfull of children. William, 
David, Jane, Stephen, Lewis and Sarah were born here, 
and were the first white natives of Hinckley. A frame 
house was eventually built near the cabin. It was a small 
shingled structure, and two or three small rooms were added 
to it at later times. There was a big stone fireplace in the 
main room where the cooking was done. This also furnish- 
ed the only warmth in winter. After the family moved in- 
to this new house the old cabin was used for a pig pen. If 
stray travelers happened into the vicinity they stopped with 
the Casses. These would almost without exception be 
lumbermen. The situation of the family was lonely in the 
extreme. Mrs Cass seems to have had little save work, brawls 
and children to relieve the solitude. Their near neighbors 
were a few Indians on Governor's point and wild animals. 
At one time, probably early in the pioneering days, Baxter 
Smith, his former place of residence now unknown, had a 
barn near them where he stored hay cut from the natural 
meadows around the Musquash river, and he may also have 
had a house where he and his family lived for a year or so. 
Traditions are vague about him. Despite this interval when 
they may have had w^hite neighbors Mrs. Cass said in her 
later days that there were many years when she did not see 
the face of a white woman. After coming to Hinckley she 
never left the wilderness even for a day. 

It is said that David Cass had some slight education as a 
doctor, and not only prescribed for the ailments of his own 
large family, but was in demand when sickness assailed any 
of the settlers who at length began to grapple with the un- 
tamed lands of nearby Townships. It is probable that 
whatever skill he possessed was acquired in the rough and 
by places in which most of his life was spent. 



18 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

In 1817 the first white settler, Moses Bonney, came to 
Princeton. He therefore became a neighbor only about 
eight miles from the Casses, but not very accessable to them. 
Samuel Yates came to the south side of Big leike in Town- 
ship 21 in 1833. Two or three other families soon followed 
him to the vicinity and became neighbors, the nearest not 
more than a mile distance and all of them easily reached by 
a paddle across the Icike. It must have been at about this 
time that Cass became known as "the General" and his 
wife as "Aunt Nellie." The latter was well liked by the 
neighbors, woodsmen and Indians, but the former was often 
cross grained and everybody in the region, save Samuel 
Yates, was afraid of him. Strangely enough "the General" 
stood in awe of Samuel Yates.* 

David Cass weighed, say those who remember him, over 
three hundred and eighty pounds. He was very tall and 
of a large, powerful frame. Mrs. Cass was very small. She 
never weighed more than one hundred and five pounds. 

Calais was thirty miles from Hinckley. It had in 1810 
two hundred and fifty inhabitants. Across the river St. 
Stephen was a little larger and a little older. Milltown was 
close by. These places made a sort of metropolis, bustling 
and growing, which was a constant lure to the backwoods 
pioneer. Cass made many trips there, leaving his wife alone 
with her children and unprotected from any dangers that 
might arise. Lumbermen often stored camp supplies upon 
the Cass premises. The smell of them attracted bears. 
Upon one occasion when he was enjoying metropolitan al- 
lurements little "Aunt Nellie" walked the floor all night 
brandishing an ax to frighten off an enraged bear that was 



*According to the "Yates Book" Samuel Yates was "a robust! 
man, of powerful physique." He was a son of William Yates, ar^ 
English pioneer who settled in Oxford county, Maine, and who was 
a hard working farmer on six long days of every week, and an equal- 
ly hard working and vigorous preacher of the Methodist faith ori 
Sundays. Moses Smith, Asa Crockett and Moses brown, who fol- 
lowed Samuel Yates to the western side of Sand cove, Big lake, were> 
related by marriage to him. The first was from England, the second 
from Deer Isle while the former place of residence of the latter ift 
now unknown. 



SQUATTERS, SPORTSMEN AND FIRST ROAD 19 

trying to break through the frail barriers of the cabin. 

Many stories are told of "the General. He was so 
strong that he could lift a heavy bateau to his shoulders as 
easily as an Indian could lift a canoe. He had a special 
enmity for Indians, and successfully terriorized them. On 
White's island in Big lake cranberries used to grow abund- 
antly. One day, says the story, the Indians had gathered a 
lot of them when he happened to visit the place. He at 
once demanded the berries. Upon the Indians' refusal to 
give them up he set fire to the island, and burned the berries 
and much other property belonging to them. 

Indians used to come to his cabin when he was away 
and freighten Mrs. Cass. They would steal provisions and 
whiskey. One day when they thought he was not at home 
he lay hidden. When two Indians came to the cabin he 
suddenly appeared, seized them, one in each hand, and 
dragged them to the lake shore. He waded into the water 
to his waist and ducked them repeatedly until they begged 
for mercy and promised better behavior. 

A yoke of oxen were unable to start a heavy log to 
which they were chained. He unyoked them and with his 
hands twisted and worked at the log until he moved it. 

In a dead fall trap he once caught an ox that belonged 
to Mr. Lamb, the lumber contractor. He dressed it and cut it 
up for the domestic food supply. Mr. Lam^b thought that 
at least a part of the animal should belong to him. So he 
went to see Cass about it. The giant looked him over and 
then drawled through his nose: 

"When I hunts I always hunts fer fur," an answer that 

was taken to assert his claim to not only the fur, but to all 

hat nature had put inside it. Mr. Lamb allowed his claim. 

He w^as clever as w^ell as strong. Once he was im- 
prisoned at St. Stephen for debt.* The next morning he 
was found comfortably seated on a bench out side the jail. 
It could not be found out how he had liberated himself. He 
was again locked up, but the next morning he was again free. 

•According to the story St. Stephen was the place of his arrest. 
It probably was Milltown, Maine, or Calais. 



20 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

Since no locks could hold him he was allowed to go home. 
Once, says tradition, he indulged as usual in much strong 
drink when he was in St. Stephen, and a lawless celebration 
followed. A few days later the sheriff and his assistant 
came up into the woods after him. He submitted to arrest, 
and got into the canoe of his captors. When they had pad- 
dled a little way into the lake he said suddenly in his usual 
twang: 

"Gentlemen, can you swim?" 

One could swim a little; the other not at all. 

"It's too bad," said he. "I has fits — I feels one coming 
on. I might upset the boat so you'd better paddle to shore " 

They paddled to the shore as quickly as possible. After 
landing instead of falling in a fit Cass took his captors, one 
in each hand, by the coat collars and forced them to a fence. 
He thrust their heads through the top rail, and jammed it 
down hard enough upon their necks to hold them. He then 
walked to his house a free man. There is some doubt a- 
bout the authenticity of this interesting incident, but it serves 
as an illustration of the reputation left behind him. 

He would go off on hunting trips in the woods, and take 
nothing with him but his gun, powder and a bag of salt. He 
would live upon game and berries and sleep at night with- 
out other covering than leaves. Sometimes he would col- 
lect as many as three hundred dollars worth of furs, a fairly 
large amount at that time. *These would be taken down 

*The sort of pleasures to be had down the river, and likely to 
attract David Cass are thus described by John S. Springer, in "Forest 

Life and Forest Trees' Winter Camp Life Among the Loggers, and 

Wild Wood Adventurers" Harper and Brothers, I85L "It vk^ould 
be difficult to give an exaggerated sketch of the drunken practices 
among loggers twenty-five years ago. I recollect that matters were 
carried so far at Milltown that the loggers would arrest passersby, 
take them by force, bring them into the toll house grog shop, and 
baptise them by pouring a quart of rum over their heads. Distinc- 
tions of grade v/ere lost sight of, and the office of deacon or priest 
constituted no exemption pass against the ordeal, rather the rite 
profaned. This process of ablution was practiced with such zeal 
upon their own craft, and transient passers-by, that a hogshead of 
rum was draw^n in a short time, running in brooks over the floor. 
The affair was conducted amid the most boisterous and immoderate 
merriment — the more distinguished the candidate the more hearty 
the fun." 



SQUATTERS, SPORTSMEN AND FIRST ROAD 2 1 

the lakes and river to Calais or St. Stephen to market. He 
would take a list of the necessities for the family and house 
carefully written out by "Aunt Nellie." If, after he had 
disposed of the furs, he resisted the temptation to conviv- 
iality he would return with every article, upon the list. If he 
did not resist temptation he would come home empty hand- 
ed and the family would resign itself to the consequent dis- 
tresses. 

TTiere was often riotous merriment around the Cass 
home. Gangs of lumbermen coming up into the woods 
were always well supplied with whiskey. This was a reg- 
ular stopping place where they often consumed a fair por- 
tion of it. When drunk they would dance and sing and 
perform many clownish antics. A favorite one was to 
catch the dog and dip it into a barrel of tar that was kept 
standing in the yard for the smearing of seams of boats. 
After a good coating of tar the animal was rolled in the 
abundant chips that littered the yard. After this treatment 
it ran wildly around to the great amusement of the men. 

It is only by means of such stories that glimpses are 
caught of those early days in the Township. A certain 
measure of prosperity came to David Cass. He cleared 
about one hundred acres of woodland, and collected stump- 
age upon three hundred acres more. He raised pigs and 
found it a profitable business although at that time they 
sold for seventy five cents each. He kept six or seven 
cows, and two or three yokes of oxen. When he was sev- 
enty three years old his pecularities, which had been increas- 
ing with the years, developed into actual insanity, and it 
was necessary to take him to the state hospital at Augusta, 
The journey was begun by a paddle down the well known 
way over the lakes to Princeton — by that tiiue a settle- 
ment struggling into village size. He was fastened into 
a stall in a barn for safe keeping over night. The next 
morning he was outside the barn although it had been 
carefully and, it was thought, securely fastened. Fortunately 
he had lingered in the vicinity. It was August 14th, 1847, 
when he was admitted to the state asylum, and on January 



22 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

6th, 1850, he died there suddenly of apoplexy at the age 
of seventy-six years. 

The care of the Cass homestead fell to the eldest son, 
Edward. He was unmarried, and, say those who remem- 
ber him, was a melancholy man, conscious of his lack of ed- 
ucation and his uncouth environments. He more nearly 
resembled his father in size than any of the other sons. 
Stephen also never married. He spent his life upon this 
homestead. Mary Ann married Joseph Hold, whose name 
became corrupted to Holes, and who came from Amity. 
They chose a spot on the south slide of Big lake, in Township 
2 1 , near the narrows that connects it w^ith Long lake and 
there lived lives of pioneering hardship. Jane, early 

married Richard Brown and left this Township to live in 
southern New Brunswick where her husband owned a saw 
mill. Sarah, usually called Sally, died at about the age of 
forty unmarried. She was a large woman, although not 
tall. She was timid, and often hid during the visits of hil- 
arious woodsmen. Every member of the family seems to 
have been carefully weighed and for many years a record of 
the respective avoirdupois was mentally kept. This record 
is partly forgotten now, but Sarah is said to have weighed 
three hundred and fifty pounds. Lewis died in infancy. 
That only one of these wilderness born and reared children 
did not live to reach maturity is a tribute to "Aunt Nellie's" 
care and skill. William married Mary Todd, a reputed 
school teacher of Milltown. He settled west of his father's 
home, taking one hundred acres of the wild land. He was 
thriftless and his wife not competent for the duties that con- 
fronted her. In later years the family were in want. The 
last of William's life was spent in the house his father built. 
His own place w^as sold for taxes. David married Mary 
Yates, a daughter of Samuel Yates. He settled about four 
miles west of the original home and took one hundred and 
fifty acres of the wild land. It was in this very comfortable 
home that "Aunt Nellie" spent her last years. Her mind, 
like her husband's, eventually lost its balance. The hard- 
ships, loneliness and deprivations of this rough life might 



SQUATTERS, SPORTSMEN AND FIRST ROAD 23 

Well have been its ruin. It is said that during the last years 
of her life she would take an aix to bed. Probably pertur- 
bed ideas of dangers long passed still haunted her — the 
bear she had warded off through a whole lonely night, the 
constant menace of bears and wolves*, visits of drunken 
Indians when her husband was away, drunken woodcutters 
and river drivers and the ugly moods of David himself. Bits 
of the past must have constantly passed through her mind 
like a jumbled nightmare of horrors. One day at noon she 
disappeared. She was never seen again although four hun- 
dred men, hastily assembled from far and near, searched the 
woods for her This happened in 1870, and to this day 
not the least clue to her fate has been found. A rather 
strange incident happened about three years after her dis- 
appearance, however, which may possibly lay open a subse- 
quent bit of her life. 

At that time Mr. Jackson Brown, one of the early settlers 
of the village, then recently and suddenly sprung into exis- 
tence, lived temporarily tin an old log camp long used by 
lumbermen. It stood on a knoll on the west side of the stream 
just above the dam, and perhaps six hundred yards from the 
clustered buildings in the village center. One evening in 
the winter when it was cold and clear a light crust had 
formed over ,the new snow that covered the ground. 
Mrs. Brown and several of the children were in the camp. It 
was very quiet around it. The windows were uncurtained. 
TTie family suddenly saw an old woman standing outside a 
window and looking in upon them. She was very small, 
not larger than a ten years old girl, says Mrs. Brown in de- 
scribing her, and her face was deeply furrowed. She was 
so outlandish looking that a panic seized most of the fam- 
ily. They retreated to the further side of the room. She 
said nothing, but held up her hand upon which a white rag 
was tied. She stood for some time looking into the room, 

*Once when William Cass, then a youpp; man, was driving an ox 
team across the ice of Big lake with a sledpe of supplies he was set 
upon by wolves. They jumped upon the load, and to save himself 
from their attack he rode crouched down on the pole between the 
oxen. This story is told by Mis. Ellen Hawkins. 



24 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

an unknown, disheveled woman. At length she went away. 

When Mr. Brown came home the ground under the 
window was looked at carefully by the light of a lantern, but 
there were no tracks discovered upon it. That the thin 
crust over the snow was not broken seemed to confirm the 
family's belief that their visitor was supernatural. It cer- 
tainly proved that she was very small and slight. 
To suggest that this woman was Mrs. Cass raises a multi- 
tude of obvious questions and doubts, and leaves the mys- 
tery of her disappearance still unsolved. 

It is thought by some that after she left her son's house 
she wandered back toward her old home, fell into the in- 
tervening swamp and sank beneath its surface. She had 
often been known to attempt to wander back to the old 
place. It is more generally believed, however, that she 
was drowned in Big lake and so again found in the waters 
over which she traveled to come here the way to another 
unknown land, it must be it seems, of happier event. Many 
times she must have gazed at the sunlit, open lake for relief 
from the interminable shade of the forest; again and again 
in curiosity and longing her thoughts must have reached over 
this pathway to the wide world beyond her knowledge. 
Dimly her sick mind might perceive it to be the way of rest. 

"She was very kind, a very dear woman," says one who 
remembers her. 

Nathanial Scribner, his wife and three children of Jack- 
son's Brook, now Brookton, made a settlement near the 
Casses in Hinckley. They remained there four or five years. 
This was probably shortly after settlers began to move into 
the Townships south and southeast of Hinckley — in the lat- 
ter part of the third or the first part of the fourth decade of 
the nineteenth century. The traditions are too vague to 
accurately determine the time of the Scribner residence here. 
In about 1 862-3, Edward Cass rented the homestead to John 
Robinson of Number 2 1 , a pioneer near the Yates settle- 
ment. The Robinsons lived here five yenrs, payiTTT as rent 
part of the produce raised. In 1870 Edward sold to Delue 
Simpson of St. Stephen three hundred acres of his father's 



SQUATTERS, SPORTSMEN AND FIRST ROAD 25 

estate. Mr. Simpson raised here cattle, horses and sheep. 

The last years of Edward Cass were passed in Township 
2 1 at the home of Moses Brown.* 

When the wild land of this neighboring Township began 
to show a few openings for the homes of settlers the sons 
and daughters of David Cass for the first time in their lives 
experienced a few social amenities. At the homes of Samuel 
Yates, of Moses Brown and others dances were occasionally 
held. All the settlers would attend and even the Indians 
would come. The hair of the squaws would shine with 
grease, and their best clothes, so far as they had any best 
would be worn. They often sat back against the wall, or 
stood in the background while the dancing was going on. 
Sometimes the music for these dances would be the singing 
of the company, and a clapping of hands to mark the time. 
Sometimes a fiddler and his fiddle would be in attendance. 
Sometimes the settlers would gather at on« home to push 
through a special work too great, or too pressing for the 
usual family workers. These occasions had a spice of fes- 
tivity about them. It was at a school held in a room of 
Samuel Yate's house that David and William Cass, both fully 
grown men, struggled to attain the art of reading and writ- 
ing. 

A few of the descendants of "the General" and "Aunt 
Nellie" still live in Hinckley, but none of them bear the name 
of Cass. 

Ananijah Munson is another of the dim figures of the 
past. A few former river drivers, now old men, remember 
him first as the owner of a snnall farm near Princeton where 

*Moses Brown and John Robinson were pioneers of Big lake who 
chose sites in the untouched forest a little to the south of the Yates, 
Smith and Crockett homes. The former probably came from Bailey- 
ville; the latter* came from Portland, Maine. Wolves, which in- 
fested Bi?: lake for several years prior to 1852, often prowled about 
these isolated cabins. To keep them out of the Robinson home a 
heavy timber was each night wedged between the chimney jamb and 
the front door. These two homes were abandoned after a few 
years. They were inaccessible by land on account of the surround- 
ine woods and swamps, and the water approach was often impas- 
sable, especially for weeks in the spring and fall when the ice was 
breaking up or forming. The forest has now almost reclaimed the 
land that they cleared with great effort. 



26 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

he used to drive a yoke of cows instead of oxen. For some 
reason he gave up this farm, and went to Stone's island on 
Big lake. Here he cut down every tree and bush. His 
plans for farming miscarried, however, for the Indians soon 
claimed the island and drove him off it. That he worked 
hard, although in ill health, is proved for afterward seven or 
eight tons of hay a year were cut from the island. One 
autumn he taught school, gathering his dozen or more pupils 
from the families of settlers around Big lake. One of his 
former pupils, now over eighty years of age, remembers be- 
ing sent out to cut a withe for his own punishment. He got 
a good, capable one, but into the under side of it he cut 
deeply every few inches. By careful handling !t was made 
to appear intact. The master took it, drew back his arm 
for an effective blow when the withe fell to pieces. The 
culprit was standing conveniently stooped before him. The 
latter was seen to conceal a smile. He threw the withe 
away, then sternly sent the boy to his seat. He apparently 
forgave him for the punishment was never received. All 
of this happened before Mr. Munson came to Hinckley. He 
seems then to have been an unfortunate old man. He had 
tw^o young sons, George and David. Joseph Pollis, at that 
time a lumber contractor, encouraged him and probably 
helped him to establish himself near the dam on the west 
side of the stream. This w^as five or six miles from the Cass 
clearing. He was given the task of seeing that the dam was 
always in repair. This seems to have been a kind hearted ef- 
fort to assist him for it is the only instance of the dam receiv- 
ing such attention until recent years. River drivers made tem 
porary repairs during the spring drives. There were even 
times when it disappeared altogether for Samuel Yates told 
his! son that he used to drive logs through the stream when 
there was no dam. However in about 1845 Munson be- 
gan to give it special attention, and probably continued the 
work for several years. His first home was a little dug out 
in the sand bank just above the dam, or below the present 
.«ite of it. Later he built a shack on a spot between the 
present residence of Mr. Truman Brown and the summer 



SQUATTERS, SPORTSMEN AND FIRST ROAD 2 7 

camp of Mr. F. L. Atkinson. It is said that his two sons 
ran away from him while he was here. River drivers, it was 
suspected, inspired them. Taking a skiff or canoe they pad- 
dled down Big lake bound on far adventures. They are 
not to be greatly blamed for this. Attractive tales of the 
great outside world must have often reached their ears. 
Their travels were cut short for their father, greatly angered, 
went after them and brought them home. 

Mr. Munson himself seems to have had some taint of the 
desire to rove for he eventually went to a small island on 
Grand lake. Just how long he stayed there is uncertain. 
It was not long, however. He was taken ill and a relative 
from Princeton took him back to that village where he died 
before 1853. The island received his name. 

The next settler to come to Hinckley was James Dibble 
of Woodstock, New Brunswick. In 1870, just a few months 
before the Shaw brothers purchased the Township and be- 
gan work for a tannery, he built a house, pyramid shaped, 
at Big falls, a pretty spot midway the stream. Here his son 
was born. He was the first white child to see the light with- 
in the limits of the Township's new village which was soon 
to come into existence and was to be called Grand Lak» 
Stream. The child was named for two sportsmen, John 
Simpson and John Babcock, both of Portland, Maine, who 
used to camp near the spot. He was thus John Babcock 
Dibble. 

Joseph Henry Hawkins, born in Lubec, Maine, and his 
wife, Ellen, (daughter of Mary Ann Cass Hold) made a 
small clearing on the north shore of Big lake just west of the 
William Cass place. They were married in June, 1871, 
and immediately began pioneering. 

William Gould came to the northern edge of Township 
27 where it borders on Hinckley in 1854 or 1855. Here, 
almost at the outlet of Grand lake stream, he built a land- 
ing which at once became the point of entry fnto the Town- 
ship for sportsmen. For by that time the fame of the sal- 
mon in the stream was known to many zdalous fishermen. 
Many distinguished men were among those who came here 



28 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

from all parts of New England, New Brunswick, New York 
and even from Pennsylvania and North Carolina. Some- 
times as many as fifty tents would dot the woods along the 
sides of the stream during the spring season. A favorite 
site for them was on the east side of the stream. Beginning 
at th,e dam they would stretch a quarter of a mile or morei 
along the bank. West of the stream the line was shorter, 
extending not more than a hundred yards, or from a spot 
near the present dam to another opposite the house built 
later by Thomas Calligan. Besides these clusters there 
would be tents scattered about in other places. 

Two sportsmen from Massachusetts camped upon the 
stream at Little falls in September 1870 for about erght 
days. They were paddled up over Big lake to the spot 
by their Indian guides, Peter Sepris and his son Joa, It 
was a twelve miles trip. *One of them writes that they 
"took sixty- two of those beautiful fish averaging two pounds 
or better each." They made two or three visits to the dam 
where they found four gentlemen encamped — solitary in- 
habitants of the wilderness. 

In those days tents and all camp outfits were brought 
in over the old Indian carry — at first on the shoulders of 
Indian guides. A sort of road was gradually worn over 
this route. Mr. Charles A. Rolfe of Princeton, who re- 
members those times well, says that it was the "worst old 
tote road" he ever traveled. 

"Mr. Gould built a heavy truck wagon with long cixles 
for the wheels to play back and forth on so that when one 
of them struck a big granite boulder it would slip in or out 
eight or ten inches and pass by the rock instead of over it," 
says Mr. Rolfe in a letter. "With that wagon he managed 
to tote baggage over the road to the dam, but no one ever 
dared to let him tote a canoe. **The Indians preferred to 
carry theirs on their shoulders. The guides were all Indians 
in those days — and w^ere good guides too. Fishing was 
done on the stream only, and just above the dam. Lake 

*Mr. J. Augustine Wade of Cambridge. 

**Mr. Wade calls Mr. Gould's wagon a jumper wagon. 



SQUATTERS. SPORTSMEN AND FIRST ROAD 29 

trolling did not come into vogue until well into the severi- 
ties." 

In all this time the "old tote road" of which Mr. Rolfe 
writes had been the only one in the Township — unless there 
were still rougher logging roads that led to forests fastnes- 
ses. In 1 867 a company was formed, the members of which 
were Joseph Granger, William Duren, A. Halligan, L. L. 
Wadsworth and others of Calais and Putnam Rolfe of Prince 
ton whose object was to build a road which should begin 
on the Houlton road, two miles north of Princeton, and 
pass through a number of Townships, among them Hinckley, 
to Milford on the Penobscot river, thence to Bangor.* Ac- 
cording to a book written by Major Frederick Wood, "The 
Turnpikes of New England," published in 1919, the charter 
was given in 1863 and this "Granger Turnpike Company" 
was the only one chartered by the Maine Legislature to 
built turnpikes despite the fact that after the seraration 
from Massachusetts, Maine "adopted a comprehensive code 
of general laws," to form road building corporations. In 
his book Major Wood says that "the Legislature resolved 
that thirty thousand dollars should be appropriated from 
the sale of public lands and timber, and that as fast as the 
corporations had expended thirteen thousand dollars of its 
own money, the state should contribute ten thousand dollars 
of the appropriation to continue the work."** TTie name 
was afterward changed to "Princeton and Milford Turnpike 
Company." The road was surveyed and work was begun 
in 1 869. It was in a very rough state from the Houiton 
road to the stream when the Shaw Brothers began work on 
a tannery close to the stream in Hinckley. Obstacles, both 
financial and physical, had paralyzed the turnpike company's 
efforts. Its difficulties were brought before the Legislature, 
and in 1 876 all public money set aside for its assistance was 
turned back into the state treasury. West of the stream 

}<• 

'Information given by Mr. Rolfe. 

**According to Mr. Rolfe $2,000 was to be spent by the state on 
the road for every $2,000 which the turnpike company spent. This 
seems to have been a later arrangement. 



30 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

three or four miles of, road had been "grubbed out" when 
the project was abandoned. If the road had been com- 
pleted it would have opened a lot of new farming and tim- 
ber land, and shortened the distance to Bangor, as it was 
and still is necessary to travel, by forty miles. 

A few yards west of the border of Indian Township 
this road crosses the Musquash river, the waterway into the 
middle of the Hinckley Township. Swamps stretch on 
either side of it, and have been, and are, a trial to road mak- 
ers. Many wagons have been mired here. The bridge 
over it is the subject of a poem by a local poet which will be 
found in the appendix. 

The spot is wild, strange and gloomy. Early settlers 
of Big Lake came here when the land was frozen, and cut 
meadow hay, sometimes with the knowledge that wolves 
were lurking near. *Once two men who came over the ice 
o- Big Lake w^ith an ox team to carry home a load of thisi 
hay were caught in a heavy snow storm and lost their way. 
They remained all night in a perilous, white, whirling wilder- 
ness, suffering with cold and hunger. In the morning, 
fortunately, they were able to find the way home. 



♦Jackson Brown and Milford Crosby of Township 21. 




< o 

c/i U 

t-U <u 

H ■• 



H 



THE TANNERY 31 

CHAPTER IV 

The Tannery 

The Messrs. William, Fayette and Thackster Shaw who 
put to rout about one half square mile of the Township's 
wilderness, were well known in the financial world when 
they undertook this new venture. They had already estab- 
lish and successfully operated several tanneries which were 
scattered over eastern Maine, and New York state and there 
were even one or two in Canada. The tannery here be- 
came the largest and for a time the most prosperous of them 
all. "The Shaws learned tanning from their father who was 
a small tanner in Commington, Mass," says the "Boston 
Daily Advertiser" of July 1st, 1883. Their capital, when 
they first began business, was about $4,000, the same paper 
asserts. Business headquarters for all of the tanneries were 
in Boston. Mr. Charles Bates was a member of the local 
firm for about two yeeirs. It Was then known as Shaw and 
Bates. Afterward it was the F. Shaw and Brothers. 

Early in the summer of 1870 the Shaws came here to 
see if conditions favored the construction and operation of 
a tannery. The forests for miles around were thick with 
hemlock trees, the bark of whfich was then considered es- 
sential for the tanning of leather. The magnificent chain 
of lakes furnished good facilities for moving it to the foot of 
Grand lake while in the other direction Big, Long and Lew- 
ey lakes seemed to provide an easy and inexpensive course 
for carrying freight in and out of the place. The new road 
was another link with the world, and a preliminary survey 
for a railroad to pass through the Township near the spot 
chosen for the tannery had been made. Work upon this 
railroad, however, never advanced further than this survey, 
and the choosing of a name — the Magantig. Nevertheless 
conditions were such that a trade was concluded on August 
4th, 1870, for the Township, saving only the reservations. 
lh«" price paid wa? $35,000. 

No time was lost in beginning work. Locations on the 



32 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

eastern bank of the stream were selected for the tannery 
buildings. The course of the canal was marked, and other 
preliminary matters settled. That winter gangs of workers 
came hither with picks, shovels and axes. An epoch making 
upheaval began. In the zeal to do away with the forest 
not a single tree was left standing for shade or ornamenta- 
tion in the new, small, ragged edged clearing. 

The first workers to arrive found shelter in tTie old log 
camps of the river drivers. The first work undertaken 
was the digging of the canal. Twenty three Frenchmen 
from, Montreal were the first to wield pick and shovel in the 
new ground. Three different contractors were in charge of 
this work. They were James Brown, John Love and David 
Johnson. The canal was about three hundred and fifty 
yards long, twenty feet wide at the top, fifteen at the bot- 
tom and four or five feet deep. It lay nearly parallel to 
the stream and provided a deep water passage from Grand 
lake to the tannery buildings. One of the first works was to 
build several camps, or log houses, until there were eleven 
in all. Each was soon overflowing with workers. A saw 
mill frame of hewn logs was quickly raised on the southern 
end of the bank thrown up by the canal diggers. This 
bank separated the canal from the stream. Machinery 
was placed in the saw mill, and the newly cut logs sawed 
into boards first for its own sides, and then for the other 
buildings that rapidly rose. Yet it w^as necessary to sup- 
plement its work by lumber brought up over the lower 
lakes on the "Captain Lewey," a small steamer.* A few 
feet north of the saw mill, where the Milford road crossed 
the canal and the stream, a long, high bridge of logs was 
built over both. The canal bank which passed under it 
was soon packed into a driveway by the loaded icarts and 
drays that constantly passed along it from the dam to the 
mill. Many of the logs sawed were floated to the mill in 
the canal. 



*The "Captain Lewey" is said to have been built in 1854. It 
iTctains its identity by grace of succession of parts, and is still used to 
tow tugs, and carry freight. 



THE TANNERY 33 

The mason work for the tannery was done by a French 
contractor from Montreal named Churchie. Two contract- 
ors, one named Walker and the other Peter St. Peter, 
framed the buildings and put in the machinery. 

So eager was the firm to begin business that as soon as 
a building was ready the work for which it was designed was 
begun in it. Only about one fourth of the vats were at 
first put in the tan yard. They were increased one hundred 
at a time until in about six years, six hundred, the full ca- 
pacity of the building, were placed and in use. 

The completed buildings made a long array. A bark 
mill was placed across the canal nearly opposite the saw^ 
mill. Here it could conveniently receive the loaded barges 
of bark that were floated down the canal to it. Next to this 
was the leach house. Here the ground bark was made 
into tan liquor. Beyond this was the furnace house where the 
water was heated for leaching and other processes of the 
tanning. The bark pulp, after the tan had been extracted, 
was burned here and made a very hot fire. In the furnace 
house were eight boilers, and just outside it stood two iron 
smoke stacks. One of these was eighty feet high, the other 
sixty feet. A driveway led from the road, passed the smoke 
stacks and wound to the rear of these buildings. Loads of 
boards were constantly being hauled over it from the saw 
mill for the new buildings, small dwelling houses, barns and 
sheds, that now began to thickly dot the clearing. 

This driveway divided the tannery buildings into two 
groups — the northern group, consisting of the buildings 
described, and a southern group. In this latter the tan yard 
came first. It stretched for six hundred feet by the side of 
the stream, and was eighty feet wide. When completed it 
had ten rows of sixty vats each. Two long passages raix 
down its length. Rails were laid in each for push cars in 
which the hides were moved up and down the building.. 
The dry loft which came next was a huge tower one hundred 
feet square and ten stories high. At the top was a cupola 
in which a big bell hung. This bell called the men to work at 
six in the morning, rang for the noon recess at eleven-thirty. 



34 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

recalled the men at twelve- fifteen and dismissed them at 
six in the evening. The roll loft, or finishing roonn, stood 
at right angles to the dry loft. It extended toward the road 
two hundred feet. The beam room and soEik vats were under 
the roll loft. The ample under ground sweat houses, eighty 
by one hundred feet, were joined to the beam room. Beyond 
the roll loft the hide shed extended another one hundred 
feet toward the road and nearly abutted it. An immense 
pen stock began where the canal ended and carried water 
the whole length of both groups of buildings. 

These buildings did not complete the Company's plant. 
Simultaneously with their erection locks were built between 
two of the upper lakes, Sistadobsis (usually called Dobsis) 
and Pocumpass (usually called Compass). A lock was 
also constructed between Grand lake and the canal. A 
ship carpenter and his helpers were added to the workitig 
force. They built a freight steamer, called the "Fanny 
Bates," named for the w^ife of Mr. Bates. It was the first 
steamer ever on Grand lake. A number of scows, seventy 
to seventy-six feet long, and fourteen feet wide, to be loaded 
with bark and towed by the "Fanny Bates", were also con- 
structed. There was a log store where a few staple grocer- 
ies and other articles were kept; carpenter and blacksmith 
shops were established and other needs attended. Proba- 
bly eighty or ninety men were employed in the tannery by 
the end of the first year, and as many more worked around 
the village on outside matters. 

Thus quickly and thoroughly startling changes were 
inaugurated in the Township. The new village, although 
it was never named, was called Grand Lake Stream. From 
this time forward the history of the Township centered in it. 
The business grew until within its forest covered borders 
Hinckley had the largest tannery in the world, valued at 
$250,000. 

*In I 872 a new boat landing was built on the north shore 

*A small clearing at this point is called the "Greenlaw Chopping". 
It was made by Captain George Greenleaf of Calais in 1849 and 1850 
because of the excellent hay that grew on the land. 



THE TANNERY 35 

of Big lake about a mile east of the Gould landing. A 
road was cut to this landing from a point on the "old tote 
road" about a mile and a half fronl the tannery where the 
latter road twisted westward with the stream. A large 
hide shed or freight house was erected at this landing. It 
became a very busy place. 

Bark camps were established on the shores of the upper 
lakes, and in the deeper stretches of the forests. Two or 
three hundred men were employed at these camps In a sum- 
mer season. Gathering the bark was an important part of 
the Company's business. In June, July and August when 
the sap w^as running and the bark w^as easily peeled, the 
black flies, mosquitoes and midges were a constant torment 
to the men in the woods, but nothing was allowed to inter- 
fere with their tasks. The bark would be stacked in cord 
and half cord piles and then yarded. If it happened to be 
on a convenient lake shore it was taken at once to the tan- 
nery. If it was inconveniently situated it and the logs from 
which it was peeled would, 'during the winter, be hauled 
to landings on Dobsis, Scraggley or Junior lakes. All sum- 
mer the work of getting the bark to the village would contin- 
ue. From lake landings it would be loaded onto barges 
and the "Fanny Bates" would tow four of them at once, two 
on each side, down to the foot of Grand lake. Sometimes 
it was a twenty-five miles journey. On Dobsis lake there 
was a boat called "Dobsis Loon" that helped in this work, 
particularly when the water was low. In times of special 
stress it made short trips back and forth on Dobsis lake tak- 
ing the barges to the locks there where the "Fanny Bates" 
could more readily get them. 

When the scows of bark reached the dam they would be 
taken through the lock. Some of them went directly to the 
tannery ;others had their contents piled along the sides of 
the canal. As the business grew these bark piles were in 
every available place around the stream and tannery. 

The work of bark collecting required many horses. In 
1881, when the business was most prosperous, at City Camp, 
on Second Chain lake, fifty pairs of horses were needed to 



36 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

haul bark and logs to Dobsis lake. At the same time, eight 
miles away at another camp, eight pairs were used. Four 
miles further twenty four pairs were used. From around 
Scraggly lake at the same time, six hundred cords of bark 
were being taken which necessitated the use of many more 
horses. One hunrded pairs worked constantly in the village. 
Probably the Company owned and used four hundred pairs 
of horses for a season's bark hauling. Forty cords of bark 
were consumed in a single day in the tannery, but even this 
great amount did not furnish sufficient tan liquor. It was 
brought from outside tan extract works. Probably twenty- 
five barge loads of it a w^eek w^ere hauled over almost im- 
passable roads to the vats of the village. 

The hemlock logs from which the bark was stripped 
were floated down the lakes and streams in the spring. 
Those that were not needed in the village passed along to 
the lumber mills at Milltown. Log driving on Grand and 
the upper lakes was at that time still accomplished by the 
old fashioned m.ethod of a capstan on a raft. A great an- 
chor attached to a long tow line would be carried ahead by 
men in a small boat, dropped into the water, and then the 
raft would be drawn up to it by winding the line upon the 
capstan. This work went on unceasingly day and night. 
On Big lake the "Captain Lewey" did this w^ork. 

After the tannery had been in operation about six years 
the drafts of the iron smoke stacks became so unsatisfactory 
that the stacks were taken down. Bricks for a chimney 
were burned at Big Falls where a brick yard was established. 
Three master masons came from Montreal to build the chim- 
ney. At that time eight more boilers were added to the 
furnace house equipment, and a whistle took the place of 
the bell. The latter still hung in the cupola, and w^as used 
on various occasions. One of these was tolling to the vil- 
lage the news of the death of General Grant. 

At the time of its greatest prosperity the tannery gave 
employment to more than one hundred and fifty men at 
inside work, and as many more w^orked upon the bark in 
the village. Sometimes twelve hundred hides would be 



THE TANNERY 37 

finished in a day. All of these hides, coming in raw and 
going out finished, made a great freight businiess. Some 
of them were hauled over the road to Princeton; others 
were hauled to the landing on Big lake and taken down Big, 
Long and Lewey lakes by the much worked "Captain Lew- 
ey." From Princeton hides were shipped over the Prince- 
ton and Calais Railroad (then called Penobscot and St. 
Croix) to Calais. From Calais some were sent to Boston 
in steamers, but the greater part w^ere carted across the 
New Brunswick border to St. Stephen. Thence they were 
shipped to Vancaboro by w^ay of the New Brunswick rail- 
road. From Vanceboro they went over the European and 
North American, the Maine Central and the Boston and 
Maine railroads to Boston. It was not only a roundabout 
but an expensive journey, and one of the contributing 
causes of the failure which eventually came. 

The process of tanning at first took about six months. 
Afterward the process was completed in four months. 
The raw hides came doubled together. They were first 
put to soak in vats of water in the beam room. Tliey 
stayed here ten days, were taken out, opened, split in two 
pieces, milled in the hide mill to soften them, and washed. 
After this process they hung in the sweat house for several 
days. This loosened the hair. They then went back to 
the hide mill to be remilled. By this time nearly all of the 
hair would have fallen off, but curriers took them and 
cleaned off any hair or flesh that might still cling to them. 
At this stage the hides were called green leather. They 
were then ready to soak in weak tan liquor. After ten 
days of this treatment they would be thickened and the 
pores opened. TTiey were then ready for the real tanning. 
This consisted of soaking them in five solutions of tan liq- 
uor. Each solution was stronger than the preceding one. 
When the tanning w^as concluded they w^ere called w^ashed 
leather, and went to the scrub room to be cleaned of the 
tan liquor. From this room they went to the dry loft, and 
were hung there to dry for a week. Afterward they were 
oiled and rolled. They were allowed to dry for a few 



38 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

days, then reoiled, polished on a roll, weighed, marked 
and shipped. 

The raw hides came from California, China, Brazil, 
Argentina, India, Zanzabar and other places. Occasion- 
ally, through accident or carelessness, horse, zebra and cam- 
el hides came in with the others and went into the indis- 
criminating jaws of the monster plant. Once, after soak- 
ing a hide, it was opened and a quantity of furs was discov- 
ered. Unfortunately they were then spoiled. Whether a 
lone smuggler had thus hidden them, hoping to sell them 
profitably, and his venture miiscarried, or whether the hide 
had been lost from the goods of an established smuggling 
enterprise no one in the tannery ever knew — or at least 
it was not generally known. 

The best sort of tanning was not done in Hinckley at 
first. The Company became dissatisfied with the work, 
and ambitious to do better. Mr. Edward Kennedy of 
Pennsylvania was sending superiorly tanned hides to the 
Boston market. The Company was able at length to se- 
cure his services as General foreman for all of its tanner- 
ies. He came to Grand Lake Stream village, bringing sev- 
enty-five experienced tanners w;ith him. In a short time 
thereafter the hides sent from here were as well tanned as 
any in the market. 



THE VILLAGE 39 

CHAPTER V 
The Village 

Nature lavished much beauty upon the spot where the 
village rose, but the builders of the tannery ruthlessly 
blemished it. After the trees were cut the land was burn- 
ed over. It bristled with blackened stumps; it was full of 
holes where stones had been pried from ancient beds for 
foundation walls and other masonry; rotted tree trunks, 
long fallen, were ground and leveled beneath busy feet; 
homes of wild animals were exposed and ruined. There 
was litter and destruction everywhere. The first camps 
were clustered around the rudimentary tannery buildings — 
seven on the eastern and four on the Western side of the 
stream. Near the place where the Company's little lOg 
store early rose a great outside oven was built. Great 
quantities of bread were baked here every day. The 
same cook presided over a kitchen nearby where men 
from two of the camps were fed. In some of the 
other camps hard working women did the cooking. These 
women were for a short time the only ones here. To pro- 
vide sufficient food and shelter for the constantly increasing 
number of workmen was one of the early problems. 

While the tannery buildings were rapidly taking shape 
the Company, with even greater haste, erected rough dwel- 
ling houses. These, like the tannery, were without paint 
inside or outside. Even after this urgent time the Company 
wasted no money upon paint. The interest of the Shaws 
in the village was financial. Whatever could promote 
the success of their business was provided. Consequently 
actual needs of residents were not overlooked, but it was 
not in their plan to cater to any esthetic tastes their ten- 
ants might possess. In 1871 they engaged Mr. John Gard- 
ner of Calais to survey the ground plot of the village. Land 
was set aside for a school house, a church and a cemetery, 
and the location of streets was indicated upon the plan. 



40 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

The actual streets, however, were for a long time but rough 
tracts for the passage of teams. Most of the houses were 
set around helter skelter where it pleased the fancy of owner 
or builder. 

By the summer of 1871 some of the men brought in their 
families. Among the first of these to reach the new village 
were Mr. and Mrs. Cushman Ripley, from Waite, Maine. 
Mrs. Ripley's first name was Lavonia. She was a small 
woman, but possessed much energy. Mr. Ripley is said to 
have been droll and interesting, but unambitious. They 
built a log house on the west side of the stream not far from 
the bridge, and Mrs. Ripley soon filled it to overflowing with 
boarders. Mr. and Mrs. Robert Grindle and their daught- 
er and son-in-law, Mr and Mrs. Spencer, all of Brookton, 
came as early as March of that year. Mr. Grindle, who was 
a carpenter by trade, built a two story frame house (still 
standing) north of and very close to the store built at about 
the same time by John Fraser, a blind man, and his son, 
both of St. Stephen. Mr. Grindle's house was soon as well 
filled with boarders as Mrs. Ripley's. Asa Hitchings, of 
Moore's Mills N. B., became clerk for Mr. Fraser, and soon 
brought his family and lived over the store. In June Mr. 
and Mrs. Augustine McDonald came here from Waite. Mr. 
McDonald was originally from Prince Edward Island. 
They came up over Big lake in a sail boat, and reached the 
settlement at about eleven o'clock at night. They camped 
that night in a house but partially completed. TTie next 
morning a dismal scene of confusion and crude beginnings 
met their eyes. Yet they and others who early came hither 
seem to have had a remarkable willingness to bear incon- 
veniences and disorder, and to keep in mind the bright pros- 
pects of the new enterprise. Excitement and hope came 
from the buzz of the saw mill, the blows of axes and ham- 
mers, the odors of freshly turned earth and of new^ lumber. 
Mr. and Mrs. McDonald's son, George, born the next year, 
was the second white child native in the villafrw. The first 
neighbors of the McDonalds' lived diagonally across the 
rough roadway. They were two young men Trom New 



THE VILLAGE 41 

Brunswick whose family name was Linklighter, but whose 
first names are now forgotten. At that time they had a 
small house to themselves, but very soon they were crowded 
into its upper story under the roof, outside stairs were built 
for their convenience, while one of the many migratory fam- 
ilies moved into the lower story. One of the Linklighters 
remained in the village nearly four years, and was the first 
blacksmith the Company employed. The blacksmith shop 
was a small, rough structure and stood between the tannery 
and the road not far from the Linklighters' house. The 
second brother, after a year or more, went away. 

Benjamin Butler and two sons of New Brunswick were 
among the first workers here. Early in the summer of 1871 
Mrs. Butler and a younger son, Martin, followed them hith- 
er. Mr. Butler cleared some land a half a mile or so west 
of the stream, and erected a house on the edge nearest the 
village. Somewhat later John Gower also attempted to 
tame the wilderness near him. Two brothers, Obed and 
Benjamin Fickett, and their families were among the early 
arrivals. The former became a lumberman and bark peeler, 
the latter a teamster. Both became permanent and es- 
teemed residents. John Brown and his famiJy of Red 
Beach moved here in July, 1871, and in August of the same 
year Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Calligan arrived and began the 
building of a home. Mr. Calligan became one of the first 
citizens of the place. Among others to reach the village in 
the first year or two of its existence and remain here were 
Mr. and Mrs. John Welch and family from New Brunswick, 
and Mr. and Mrs. Jackson Brown, with a large family of 
children, from a small settlement called Dixie in Township 
21. Edward McCartney, a bofxrdiner house keeper of 
St. Stephen, came here with his wife and several well grown 
children and built and ran the first public house. 



After ten years Mrs. McCartney died. The care of the 
house fell to the daughters, but luck had deserted it. It 
soon caught fire and was burned to the ground. A new 



42 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

house was built upon the site. It is the large, weather beat- 
en house just south of the Grand Lake Hotel. One of 
the McCartney girls married Henry Patterson, and they were 
the keepers of this new house. It remained a boarding 
house until the last days of the tannery. 



The Trask brothers of Springfield, Maine, were very 
early here. They built a log store and kept a rather large 
stock of general merchandise. A post office was estab- 
lished in this store with one of them, Lysander, as post- 
master. A stage, driven by Mr. L. Lovering, a livery 
stable keeper of Princeton, daily took the mail to the latter 
place. It left Princeton early in the morning and made the 
thirteen-miles trip to the village and return to Princeton in 
a day if the traveling was fair and there w^ere no accidents. 

Traveling to and from the village was by w^ay of the 
new^ road through the woods to Princeton in this stage or 
other conveyance, or by w^ay of the lakes in a sail boat or 
canoe. Mr. Martin Butler never forgot the trip which he 
took over it with his mother when he was a liitle boy. Many 
years later he said of it in a letter to the "Calais Traveler:" 
"We ran the risk of breaking our own necks in driving over 
the new road to Grand Lake Stream, out of which the big 
granite boulders, some as large as a small cottage, had not 
all been removed." Mrs. Thomas Calligan remembers 
that in her first trip to the settlement she had to walk part 
of the way to avoid being upset by the rocks and rough 
ground. The "old tote road" and the recently made new^ 
part to the new landing abounded in stones, stumps and 
ruts. All of the roads w^ere exceedingly muddy in w^et 
weather, and loaded wagons often sank to their hubs. Bad 
as they w^ere, however, a constant succession of carts and 
drays passed over or through them. Building material was 
coming in, and also furniture, machinery, groceries and 
everything the new community needed save fire wood and 
logs. Even then hides were being brought in raw, and car- 
ried out finished. 



THE VILLAGE 43 

A Mr. and Mrs. Dixon, who were for a sTiort time re- 
sidents of the village, lived in a camp on the western 
side of the stream. In the latter part of July of that event- 
ful summer of 1871 the camp caught fire. So little could be 
done to stay the flames that not only that camp but another 
nearby, and piles of bark and cord wood, were burned, and 
a considerable portion of the village threatened. The fire 
swept down to the water's edge before it was extinguished. 

French, Irish, Danes, Swedes — men from Nova Scotia, 
Cape Breton, stragglers from many parts of the world were 
drawn hither by the fast spreading fame of the tannery. 
The Company erected more and more houses, all cheap, 
small and flimsy. Sometiimes two or three families of 
these foreign workers would crowd into a single small 
house, and perhaps find room for a boarder or two. Most 
of these persons lived on the west side of the stream south of 
the bridge. Here, in time, there came to be twenty-eight 
houses which belonged to the Shaws. There w^ere also one 
or two owned by citizens. Mr. Trask's garden early gave way 
to them. The neighborhood became the scene of frequent 
quarrels and noisy festivities. It received the name of 
"Tough End" and has ever since retained it, although of 
late years without cause. A foot bridge crossed the stream 
near the southern end of the tannery for the convenience of 
these people. A great many of the first workers were un- 
married men. Sometimes they were perplexed to find 
homes. There was scarcely a family in the village that did 
not take some of them to board. There were no unused 
rooms in the whole village. 

The Company soon erected a large, although exceed- 
ingly plain, building on the corner of the Milford road and 
the "old tote road." This latter road was called Main 
Street, although according to Colby's Atlas its correct name 
was Water Street. In one end of the new building were the 
office rooms used by the Company. In the other end a 
large store w^as opened to succeed the log store. It soon 
drove the tw^o pioneer stores out of business. The store 
of John Eraser became the Grand Lake Hotel. 



44 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

As long as the tannery endured this hotel was used aJ- 
most exclusively by tannery workers and lumber men. Asa 
Hitchings, the first landlord, sold it to William Elsmore of 
Westley probably in 1882. A year later it was sold to 
Joseph Jellison of Miramichi, New Brunswick, and in 1 89 1 
William Brown of Princeton bought it and ran it for sixteen 
years. 

Mr. Robert Grindle sold his house in 1874. Several 
different owners each ran it for short periods. In I 886 it 
was sold to Israel Andrews of Machias. Mr. Andrews 
kept it twenty years and named it the Union House. It 
passed to his son-in-law^, William Wilson, its last landlord. 
The house became a private residence a year and a half later 
when business in the tannery was suspended. It still stands 
but is in very bad repair. 



In the days of the village beginnings there were many 
minor insufficiencies. The advent of a barber, the opening 
of a school, even the opening of a small shop for the sale of 
soft drinks, confectionary and similiar commodities by the 
energetic Mrs. Lavonia Ripley were events of importance. 
The remoteness of this new settlement from any town of 
consequence made it necessary to meet here the needs of 
an independent if rather lean existence, and they were met 
with almost marvelous rapidity. 

The first school was kept by a Miss Eveline Hill who 
came from Topsfield, Maine. It is said that the little boys 
were so anxious to begin school work that they helped to 
lathe the house. However that may be it is a fact that some 
of those boys grew up without know^ing how to read or to 
write. After a year Miss Hill gave up the school, and Mrs. 
Stillman Sprague opened one in a log house built and used 
for a short time as a residence by Mr. Bates. She had here 
about thirty pupils. Two years later the school moved 
with Mrs. Sprague to a new house in the southern end of the 
village. In 1876 the Company built the frame school 
house still used. Mrs. Sprague taught here a year. A 



THE VILLAGE 45 

long succession of teachers have followed her. A notable 
one was Mr. James Spencer. In the days of David Cass and 
Ananijah Munson, Mr, Spencer was a young river driver 
and lumberman. He saved sufficient money to pay for a 
few terms at an advanced school, and afterward came to 
the new village to cast in his fortunes with it. He remained 
one of its citizens until his death in 1915. 

The earliest church services were held in the log school 
house where Mrs. Sprague taught. Later the new school 
house w^as used for this purpose. Services were most ir- 
regular. Among those who flocked here for new fortunes 
was the Reverend Moses Gardener of Pembroke, Maine. 
He built a house in the village, but bought a little over forty 
acres of land on the north side of the Milford road at the 
extreme edge of the village. He cleared and farmed some 
of this land, but he also preached occasionally. Sometimes 
a young theological student would be installed in the village 
for a while, or visiting clergymen would occupy the school 
platform for a Sunday or two. Mr. Gardner or Mr. Gor- 
ham Gould (son of William Gould who built the first land- 
ing) read funeral services when there was no regularly in- 
stalled minister. Though church services were more or less 
irregular a Sunday school was held each Sunday with Ben- 
jamin Fickett as its first superintendent. 

Dances were an early and frequent amusement. A 
favorite dance hall was the second and unfinished story of a 
house situated on a knoll behind the present post office. 
This place was called Cross Hall, and was sometimes used 
for wakes. 

Summer holidays were celebrated by various outdoor 
sports. A Fourth of July observance consisted of dancing, 
horse pulling, log rolling, walking a tight rope over water, 
wheelbarrow races, canoe races for white men and canoe 
races for Indians, swimming horses with men on their backs 
and many other performances of a like nature. At first 
"fiddlers" furnished the music for dances and other enter- 
tainments. At length, however, enough musicians were 
found to form a band. A band master was hired ; one even- 



46 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

Ing a week \v;as devoted to practice and on every festive 
occasion thereafter for a period of two years the band was 
an indispensable adjunct. By the end of that time some 
of its members left the village, interest flagged and the band 
disbanded. Variety shows occasionally made their way 
in over the rough road. Whenever one did appear every- 
body, including the children, attended its performance. 
Sometimes on summer holidays or moonlight evenings the 
Company lent the "Fanny Bates" for excursions up the lake. 

Drunkeness was common, although efforts were made to 
prevent it. In each deed given by the Shaw Brothers was 
the proviso that "no intoxicating liquor shall ever be sold, or 
a resort maintained for prostitution on the premises." Yet 
means of obtaining liquor were not lacking. On Saturday 
evenings a wagon, or sometimes two or three, came from 
St. Stephen loaded with intoxicants. These wagons would 
stop by the roadside in a secluded spot and do a thriving 
business. If, perchance, any of the stock was left it was 
placed in the care of a discreet person who usually managed 
to dispose of it during the week. If any employee of the 
Company was caught selling liquor he was discharged. Up- 
on one occasion, at least, the St. Stephen traders were 
caught, and their liquor confiscated. On evenings when 
there was no special entertainment there was much loafing 
around the store. There was a large amount of business 
done in the evenings. Men who worked dui^ing the day 
did their trading at this time, and while the store was under 
the management of Henry Lester this part of the day was 
set aside for men, and no women were then waited upon, 

A night watchman patrolled the grounds around the 
Company's buildings. These were, in later times, lighted 
by electric lights. The rest of the village has always de- 
pended upon candles or kerosene. 

Houses now and then caught fire and usually burned to 
the ground. There was no fire department that operated 
on other than tannery buildings, but volunteers passed pails 
of water from the stream to burning houses. The tannery 
bell was rung for these fires, and the whole village turned 




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THE VILLAGE 47 

out to watch them , or to fight them. 

Occasionally somiebody would be lost in the woods. The 
bell was then pealed that its sound might guide the wanderer 
back to the village. Searching parties were also sent out. 

The cemetery was one of the earliest needs of the vil- 
lage. It was situated behind the eastern ridge that borders 
the stream. Here were buried many friendless, penniless 
strangers — human driftage that floated to this place. Their 
neglected graves are now sunken, unmarked spots. 

There was no doctor, nor in the earlier years was there 
one nearer than Calais. There was no telephone, no tele- 
graph. A doctor was summoned by the slow method of 
going for him. What with the bad condition of the roads, 
and the distance, much often vital time was consumed. 
Sometimes patients were taken to the doctor, but this was 
an especially harrowing journey. When a physician came 
to Princeton to reside conditions were a little, but not much, 
better. Most of the women were more or less expert in at- 
tending the sick, and prescribing remedies. At length it 
was discovered that one of the workers in the beam room 
showed especial skill in looking after the sick and wounded 
in the tannery. His help came to be asked m many cases 
of sickness. Suspicions were aroused by the expertness 
which he showed, and he finally admitted that he had been 
a surgeon in the English Navy and was a graduate of Glas- 
gow University. Unable to endure the disgrace that had 
resulted from too frequent indulgence in intoxicants he had 
fled from England. He drifted to the village in the incom- 
ing tide of men. He was know^n heie as Harry Spendlove. 
After his qualifications were discovered he had a great many 
patients, not only here, but in the nearby places of Waite, 
Topsfield and Princeton. He was provided with a horse 
and buggy for convenience in visiting these places. New 
clothes were given him, and he was otherwise helped and 
encouraged by the better people of the village. Neverthe- 
less after two years of reformation he again fell into his un- 
fortunate habits, and very soon left the village. Mrs. Robert 
Armstrong, sister of Mrs. Edward McCartney, living under 



48 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

the favorite dance hall, was said to be able to stop the flow 
of blood by the exercise of mystic charms. In 1882 the 
Company put a telephone into its office, and this shortened 
the time needed to procure a physician from Princeton or 
Calais, but there was still much suffering from lack of prompt 
medical attention. 

Partly to amend the too prevalent drinking habits, and 
partly for social purposes a lodge of Good Templers was 
organized in 1872. The attenapt to maintciin such a lodge 
in the raw state of the village was unsuccessful. The lodge 
fell into desuetude, but was revived and reorganized ten 
years later. At that time George Sym was Worthy Chief, 
and Mrs. Augustine McDonald Vice Chief. There were 
about forty members, and the meetings were well attended. 
Permission was obtained from the Company to finish the 
second story of the school house for ,a Good Templers' hall. 
This lodge endured for twelve or thirteen years and met 
weekly in this hall. Debating was a favorite form of en- 
tertainment. 

The wages paid tannery workers in the earliest days were 
about $1.50 a day. These declined after two or three years. 
Rollers then got ninety cents a day, beamsters seventy-five 
cents, yard men seventy-five cents, firemen, bark mill men 
and leachers each fifty cents. Bark peelers received eight or 
ten dollars a month and poor board. Later wages rose again. 
A dollar and a quarter to a dollar and a half a day was paid, 
and was considered excellent compensation. The rough, 
little houses rented at from two dollars to two dollars and a 
half a month. 

The Township was without government. There were no 
officers of any sort save the night watchman. The Company 
kept what order it could, or when serious disturbances arose 
sent to Princeton for a sheriff. The village was singularly 
free fromi actual crime. Nothing is remembered more ser- 
ious than squabbles, drunkenness and petty thieving. Im- 
provident tannery workers used sometimes to steal bark for 
fire wood. They w^ould cut trap doors in the floors of their 
houses and hide the bark under them. When the company. 



THE VILLAGE 4^ 

suspecting the thiefts, sent around inspectors no bark could 
be found. 

It was the intention of the Shaw Brothers to set off one 
square mile of land for the village. Its southern and west- 
ern boundaries were on the southern and western lines of 
the Township. The plan of the village made by Mr. John 
Gardner included a little more than a square mile. The 
settlement, however, never covered all of this land, although 
clearings did extend to the western boundary of the Town- 
ship, and on the southern boundary was the brick yard at 
Big falls. The streets, according to Colby's Atlas, pub- 
lished in 1881, were, beginning in the west and running 
north and south; High, Shaw, Water and Main: beginning 
on the north and running east and west they were Lake, 
Bates, (on the east aide of the stream only) Milford and an 
unnamed street south of and parallel to Milford. Only 
about one half of these streets have ever actually existed. 
Lake street w^as to cross the dam, but there has never been 
a public thoroughfare there. The plan of the village made 
by Gardner was the one referred to by the Shaws when con- 
veying property. Nevertheless houses were built upon 
land marked in this plan for streets. William Shaw had a 
power of attorney to sign all conveyances. There were 
about thirty of these made during the days of the Shaw^s. 

Despite the fact that so many persons owned their homes 
there was no residence of size or distinction in the village. 
The house built by Mr. Bates on the IVlilford road nearly 
opposite the Company's offices, the one built by the Rev. 
Moses Gardner on Water Street just below the tannery and 
the one built by Mr. Calligan on the west side of the stream 
near the dam were among the best, but these were all small. 
The roads remained bad. On the west side of the stream 
north of the bridge Shaw street was not laid out. People 
picked their way along through bark piles and rubbish. 
Tan bark was everyw^here that a place could be found for 
it. The stream was covered with sawdust from the saw 
mill, and polluted by some of the filthy scrapings from the 
beam room. Some of this refuse, hair and rotted flesh, was 



50 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

used for fertilizer. Carts loaded with it dripped their con- 
tents on the roads, and an indescribable stench arose from 
it. The village was at all times saturated with this stench. 
The bare gravel bank thrown up by the canal diggers 
remained for some years an ugly scar. The rocks, pried 
up and rolled out of the way and the bark piles were its 
only decorations. in the zest to do away with the forest 
not a tree had been left standing for the distance from the 
dam to the furthest house. Yet gradually a few beauties 
crept into the place. Trees and bushes sprang up in places 
along the banks of the stream. Id some of the dooryards 
fruit trees, cinnamon rose bushes, lilacs and flower beds be- 
gan to show bits of color against the back ground of forest 
green, of gravel and of unpainted, darkening houses. 

In spring, summer and autumn the constant arrival of 
bark from up the lakes, and its unloading, added to an activ- 
ity which from the beginning of the village never ceased to 
be great. Loaded drays of hides were always passing over 
the roads, merchandise for the store was coming in, teams 
were busy with lumber or refuse, or in hauling the bark from 
piles around the village to the bark mill. Work, smell and 
confusion were ever present realities. 

Men came hither seeking work in the tannery for whom 
no work could be found. To give them temporary occu- 
pation and support the Company established a farm (mis- 
named poor farm) a short way out on the Milford road. 
These superfluous men were sent there to clear and work 
land. Sometimes they were soon called to the tannery; 
sometimes after a short stay they left the village. They 
were in no sense paupers for they received nothing that they 
did not earn. 

A year or two after the beginning of business in the tan- 
nery it was discovered that there was not sufficient water for 
the saw mill. To make a mill pond the course of the stream 
was moved to the westward for a hundred yards or more 
just above the bridge. This left a space between the stream 
and the canal for the pond. Two bridges were now needed 
instead of the single arching one that had spanned both 



THE VILLAGE 51 

Lream and canal for the road space between them had 
been lengthened by the width of the new mill pond. The 
new bridges which the Company erected were rather un- 
substantial structures. The one over the stream was well 
worn by 1881. One day during that summer when a load 
of lumber and shingles, drawn by a pair of horses, was on it 
it gave way and precipitated cart, horses, driver and two 
boys who accompanied him into the stream. The driver 
and one of the boys were lame, but they reached the shore 
uninjured. TTie other boy, Eddie Calligan, son of Mr. and 
Mrs. Thomas Calligan, nine years old, agile and well, was 
drowned. 

A temporary foot bridge was thrown across the stream 
below the saw mill. This, though shaky and frail, was in 
use some time before the Company replaced the broken 
bridge. In the meantime it was impossible to drive to the 
western side of the stream. 



52 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

CHAPTER VI 
Lcikenwild 

In the second decade of the tannery interest for a short 
time flowed back to the neighborhood of the Cass settle- 
ment. Here a wildcat enterprise twined itself into the old 
Township's history. Mr. N. S. Reed, the perpetrator, be- 
gan his ventures for easy fortunes in this part of the world 
by a lottery at St. Stephen. The lottery was lucrative, but 
the police interfered with it and it had to be abandoned. 
Mr. Reed then turned his attention to Hinckley for the quick 
growth and spreading fame of its village. Grand Lake 
Stream, was in some degree an advertisment for his own 
scheme. 

He purchased about six hundred acres of land on Nem- 
cass, or Governors' point for the site of his operations. Of 
this land one hundred acres were bought of Mr. Charles 
Rolfe of Princeton, and were the Indian reservation set aside 
by Massachusetts. Mr. Rolfe purchased them from Maine, 
and their improvements — a small clearing and house — of 
Peal Tomah, an Indian. Three hundred acres of the old 
Cass estate had been sold to Delue Simson by Edw^ard Cass 
in about 1870, it will be remembered. Mr. Reed bought 
this land, and in addition two hundred acres of the F. Shaw 
and Brothers. With this estate, mostly marsh land or for- 
ests, and called Lakenw^ild, he w^as ready for the new ven- 
ture. On the extreme tip of the point he built a handsome 
residence for himself. It was surrounded by a w^ell kept 
law^n. He had a boat house and a substantial w^harf. An 
elaborate prospectus, printed by a map publishing company 
of Philadelphia, his original home, show^ed this residence 
as the scene of a pleasant bustle. Around it spread 
Lakenwild carefully surveyed. There was a boulevard 
around the lake shore, and well arranged streets and parks. 
A splend'd hotel was also pictured; steamers w^ere shown 
on the lake: carriages with prancing horses helped to en- 
hance the scene. It is probable that when Mir. Reed stu- 



LAKENWILD 53 

died this engaging picture he sometimes forgot that much 
of this land, save where his own residence stood, was hope- 
less bog or forests and believed in his scheme. To ac- 
company the prospectus, and equally attractive, were pam- 
plets of descriptions and terms. 

"Every lot faces upon a street and is so located as to 
take in the surrounding beauties of nature. Each lot has 
a street frontage measuring one and one half rods pvA ex- 
tending back six rods. . . .Terms $2.00 down and balance 
in four monthly payments of $2.00 each .... If you wish we 
will build you a nice cottage from $200.00 to $2,000.00. . 
Send on your designs and we will carry them owt Pros- 
pects of Lakenwild are brilliant in the extreme. Far f-eeing 
men of capital and shrewdness are investing in lots wnile 
many overworked, ill fed and plodding clerks, mechanics, 
mill operatives in town and city are taking advantage of the 
generous terms offered, and buying up lots." 

In the prospectus lots were marked !as reserved for 
schools, churches, lodges and other beneficent and social 
purposes.. Only five hundred lots were to be sold at 
$10.00 each, the pamphlet warned. The rest of them 
would cost not less than $100.00 each. 

These advertisments naturally annealed to the imag- 
inations of many "over worked, ill fed and plodding clerkf!, 
mechanics, mill operatives" and other ptruo'c^ling perrons. 
Thousands of lots were sold. Notarv fees and other expen- 
siVes of the transfer made them cost their ne^v owner?' about 
$16.00 each. Some eager niirchasers took several lots. 

Mr. Reed's mail came to Princeton, and so increased the 
business of that office that it w^a55 raised from a commission 
to a third class, salaried post office. He probably made, 
said a man w^ho had been an interested sncctator of this 
little drama, one thousand per cent on h's investment. 

A road w^ar! cut from his residence to the Mil ford road 
joining the latter near the eastern end of the Townshio. 
This probablv cost him five or six hundred dollars. He 
was hospitable, and genial and w^ell liked hy those w^ho 
knew him. Sometimes Mrs. Reed came from. Philadelphia 



54 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

to make short visits. She brought a maid and many pretty- 
clothes. The place soon became most interesting to the 
village people, but they did not invest in it. 

The hayday of Lakenwild passed when purchasers came 
to take possession of their land. Someone remembers 
meeting an old mian on the wharf there one day. The 
stranger was trembling; his eyes were wet. He had sold 
his house, he said, to invest in Lakenwild. It had been all 
that he had in the world. He had bought land with two 
or three hundred dollars of the proceeds, and spent pi'ac- 
tically all of the rest for a grist mill. He had expected to 
put up some sort of temporary shelter for his family, set up 
his grist mill and grind corn for the new settlers who, said 
one pamphlet, needed just such work done. He dreamed of 
eventually building a fine house, and of spending his last 
days in peace and prosperity. He found his land useless 
swamp land and no new settlers, nor old either, in the re- 
gion. 

A woman no longer young, put her few savings into 
lots in the hope of increasing them to a sum substantial 
enough to support her old age. Years afterward she wrote 
to one of the assessors of the village to see if enough money 
could not be raised upon her land to buy for her an entrance 
into an old ladies' homeL Unhappily the land was worth- 
less, and nothing could be done for her. This assessor re- 
ceived many similar letters. 

Practically all of Lakenwild was eventually sold for tax- 
es. But one woman of all the investors still retainjs faith 
in her investment, and regularly pays taxes on her lots. 
She has never seen them. 

Mr. Reed's residence, and about six acres of land pas- 
sed to different owners w^ho have used it for a summer 
home. It is now the property of Mr. Morrill Goddard of 
New York. 



THE TANNERY (concluded) 55 

CHAPTER VII 
The Tannery Concluded 

The failure of the Shaw Brothers was announced in the 
papers of July 31st, 1883. It was a large type, front page 
news sensation. Upon the same day, but earlier, the fail- 
ure of C. W. Copeland and Company, one of the largest 
boot and shoe firms of Boston was reported, and was said to 
be the immediate cause of the Shaws' failure. Says the 
"Boston Daily Advertiser": "The first news of the embar- 
rassment of F. iS^iciw and Brothers came from the return of 
the firm's checks from the clearing house endorsed 'no 
funds'. An hour's time after the regular settlement hour 
(one o'clock) was asked and granted, but although the 
funds at hand almost sufficed to cancel immediate obli- 
gations it was thought best to make an assignment The 

property of the firm in Maine, New York, Massachusetts and 
New Brunsw^ick was made over for the sum of $1.00 'and 
other considerations' to Mr. Ferdinand Wyman to be dis- 
posed of for ready money in the best possible way that the 
proceeds might be devoted to the payment of the creditors 
of the firm. The assignment is dated July 28th. 

An editorial in the same paper says: "The failure of F. 
Shaw and Brothers is the largest on record in the recent an- 
nals of Boston, and is an event the effects of which are like- 
ly to be felt directly in Boston, throughout Massachusetts, in 
northern New England and New York and in Canada. . . The 
firm of F. Shaw and Brothers was known to do a very large 
business, to have tanneries by the half dozen, bark by thd 
hundred thousand cords and bark lands by the million 
acres." -— '. «^t,^TH^ 

According to local accounts thirty-nine tanneries and 
extract works were involved in the failure, and the assets 
were $5,262,000 while the liabilities were $7,500,000. 

The losses of the village creditors of the Shaws were se- 
vere in proportion to their means. Probably no creditors 
suffered more. For some months previous to the failure 



56 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

little or no money had been paid in wages. Fortunately 
work was continued in the tannery; the store was kept open 
and domestic supplies could be secured there so although 
the prosperity of the village diminished its life was not ex- 
tinguished. Employees of the Company eventually received 
fifty dollars each, and one third of all remaining wages due. 

Mr. W5rman, as assignee, took over the business, and 
managed it. This arrangement soon proved unsatisfactory 
to the creditors. After about a year he was superseded by 
Mr. W. C. Clement, also of Boston, who was appointed 
trustee for the creditors. Mr. Clement remained in control 
of the business until w^ork in this tannery was suspended in 
1898. During the intervening years the tannery experien- 
ced various but always dwindling fortunes. 

At noon on the 1 1th, day of May, 1887, sparks from 
the furnace fell upon the dry roof of the tan yard. Fanned 
by a tremendous wind they quickly burned through to the 
under side where the thick festoons of cobwebs caught and 
spread the flames. TTie roll house and dry loft were satu- 
rated with oil from the leather. The ten stories of the latter 
building were a perfect flue. The flames leaped high in the 
air, circled and twisted about the cupola; suddenly the walls 
swayed; the bell clapped a last muffled sound; then walls 
and bell came crashing down together. In forty-five min- 
utes from the time the fire was discovered the tan yard, roll 
house, dry loft and beam room were in smouldering, flat 
ruins. The wind was from the northwest, and blew the 
flames away from the northern group of buildings so that 
they were not destroyed. The tannery fire department 
consisted of pumps and hose and was inadequate to cope 
with such a conflagration. The wind was so strong that 
the ice in the lake, still a foot and a half thick, was tsroken 
and driven to the foot of the lake. It was sluiced through 
the opened gates of the dam all day. It was one of the 
worst gales that the village ever experienced. 

Insurance amounted to $30,000. As soon as the fire 
was entirely out of the ruins the work of rebuilding began. 
The cost of the restored buildings was $27,000. The re- 



THE TANNERY (concluded) 57 

maining $3,000 was used to build a new boat, the "H. L. 
Drake". This boat was completed during the winter of 
1887-8, and took the place of the "Fanny Bates" already 
so well worn as to be unsafe. 

The momentum, still very great, of such a business 
carried it successfully past the misfortune of the fire. By 
September, four months after the disaster, finished hides 
were again being sent out to the world. 

Accidents in the tannery were not uncommon. Edward 
White, employed in the furnace house, was burned to death 
''n this fire. Others had narrow escapes from death or in- 
jury at the time. Somewhat later Herbert Hanscomb was 
so severely scalded in the leach house that he died in a few 
hours. Martin Butler caught his right arm in the machinery 
of the bark mill. It was so badly crushed that it had to be 
amputated. Both of these men suffered grievously from 
lack of prompt medical attendance. The latter lay in the 
Company's office a day and a half before a doctor could 
be procured. The former's sufferings were greatly aggra- 
vated by the improper remedies applied by well meaning 
relatives. 

On Sunday, the first day of October, 1883, a most pe- 
culiar accident occurred. The main boiler in the furnace 
house burst. The explosion shook the village. The air 
seemed to be full of pieces of broken boiler, rocks, bricks 
and other debris. One huge piece of fire box, weighing 
from two to three tons, was thrown into the air. It struck 
oblJquely against the top of the tall chimney, took off a cor- 
ner of it, and landed on the road three hundred feet away. 
The fourteen inch timbers of a flume in the furnace house 
were cut off, and portions of a solid four feet thick stone 
wall demolished. There was a sort of wooden bench near 
the front of the furnace. Several men were sitting on it when 
the explosion came. They were shaken off, and every one of 
them fell into a sluice way, and crawled through it to the 
stream, from which they emerged unhurt, save for their 
wetting. 

Workers in the beam room were subject to many minor 



58 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

misfortunes. Loose hair from the hides would become 
embedded under finger nails, sores would form and 
fester and nails would drop off. In scraping hides the 
skin of fore arms would be rubbed raw. Bits of rotting 
flesh from the hides, or hair, would get into these places 
and make bad sores. There were always bandaged hands 
or arms in the beam room. 

On March 19th, 1898, the old tannery was sold to the 
International Leather Trust, and its worn doors forever clos- 
ed to business. It was bankrupt. The village it had caused 
to spring up saw^ junk dealers come from Boston and buy its 
useless machinery — its boilers, engines, bark mills, hide 
mills and rollers, shafting, piping and all its hardware. It 
was a community bereavement. In all, this junk amounted 
to two hundred and tw^enty tons. As soon as the sledding 
was good the next winter it was hauled to Princeton, and 
shipped to Boston. Sometimes twenty or twenty-five teams 
were used in a single day for this w^ork. Thus denuded 
most of the old buildings fell a prey to the needs of inhabi- 
tants. It was a last benefit. Little by little they were pulled 
down, and the lumber carried off to make sheds, barns, pig 
pens and other shacks. Some of the lumber w^as used for 
fire wood. The saw mill, the bark mill and the furnace 
house were not entirely demolished. After a few years 
what remained of them caught fire, probably maliciously 
started, and burned to the ground. Even then the founda- 
tion planking, the vats, and other heavy material were left. 
Mr. Emmons Crocker, treasurer of the Union Machinery 
Company of Fitchburg, Mar5sachu!r.etts, bou^^ht all that re- 
mained of the tannery, including its site, and took away 
about ten car loads of salvage. 

The crumbling stone foundation walls are st'll left; 
there are remnants of the partly caved in sweat houses, a 
little rotting planking, partly destroyed vats and the brick 
chimney. Stagnant water often stands in the vats and in 
the hoUow^ where the tan yard was. Grass and weeds and 
bushes struggle up everywhere between planks and stones, 
and partly hide the ruins from the sight of one passing along 



THE TANNERY (concluded) 59 

the road. Nearer to the road on the higher ground is the 
immense chimney . Cows and horses now graze near it, or 
stand at rest in its shade. It is a land mark for excursionists 
on Grand lake, a summer home for thousands of swallows 
and a dangerous temptation for small boys. Several of the 
latter have climbed to its top. The chimney serves best as 
a monument to the past activities and importance of the 
village. Probably it will be less enduring than the low, 
crumbling ruins lying close to the bank of the streani and in 
the heart of the little sequestered community. 

Mr. Charles Bates was junior partner and superintend- 
ent of the business for about two years. He then retired 
from the firm and left the village. Mr. Albert Clampert 
succeeded him as superintendent, or agent. He and all 
subsequent agents for the Company were locally called 
"Outside Boss", which meant that they w^ere out side of or 
over and above, all lesser bosses. While Mr. Clampert was 
agent Mr. Henry Lester was manager of the Company's 
store. The business of this store grew rapidly. Not only 
all tannery workers traded here, taking up a large part of 
their wages in groceries and clothing, but it drew custom 
from the Machias river lumbermen. From it were sold 
from seventy to eighty thousand dollars worth of general 
merchandise a year. Mr. Clampert retained the position of 
"Outside Boss", for about ten years. Mr. D. T. Belmore 
succeeded him, and at about the same time Mr. C. E. Tarbox 
took over the management of the store, Mr. Tarbox remain- 
ed in this position until the tannery was closed when with 
Mr. George Elsmore as partner he bought the stock of goods 
and continued the business. Mr. Belmore's stay in the tan- 
nery was short. After about a year he was succeeded by 
Mr. B. C. Chadburn who was the last "Ontside Boss." 

The four foremen, bosses of the work in the tannery 
buildings, were successively, George Sym, of Montreal, 
James Kennedy, Charles Crockett and Thomas Welch. 
When Mr. Bates was here he also had a general eare of this 
work. Alvin Doten looked after the bark after it was land- 
ed in the village, and Mr. H. L. Drake (for whom the new 



60 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

boat was named) was for many years the "Head repairer", 
CcJled upon in all cases of breciks. Thomas Calligan was 
the chief engineer of the Company's boats, and had general 
oversight of them. Many times he was captain, mate, en- 
gineer, pilot emd crew at once and so acting took the heavy, 
slow moving, awkward crafts up or down the lakes — some- 
times in fogs, gales or inky darkness. Thomas Corry, 
however, usually acted as pilot, and was their captain. In 
addition to the steamers and scows there weis a boat called 
a shanty scow. A shanty containing a cook room, dining 
room and sleeping room for a crew of ten men was built 
upon a scow. This crew of men loaded the bark upon the 
scows that were towed down the lakes to the village. The 
shanty scow was usually towed from one bark landing to 
another by the "Dobsis Loon" a scow on which there Was 
an engine and a boiler and which was propelled by side 
wheels. 

The failure in 1883 marked the end of the Shaws con- 
nection with the business or the village. They had never 
lived here. Mr. William Shaw died a year or two before the 
failure. It is said that if he had lived such a reverse might 
not have occurred. While he lived he visited the tannery 
twice a month. He would go silently through its various 
departments, note everything and afterward make such 
changes as were needed. Mr. Thackster Shaw was in 
charge of other tanneries and visited the village only at 
rare intervals. Mr. Fayette Shaw was chiefly concerned 
with the Boston office. After the failure he went to Phil- 
ips, Wisconsin, and began a new tannery business. Here 
he was again unfortunate for a fire destroyed his extensive 
buildings in 1906, The following extract from the "Mil- 
waukee Sentinel" shows, in the words of an enthusiastic re- 
porter, the caliber of one of the promoters of the tannery 
which was here: 

" .... In company with Mr. Shaw I surveyed the ruins 
of his large tannery, the morning after the fire. Mr. Shaw 
salid *I am seventy years old. I have actively engaged in 
tanning leather for more than fifty years. This is the sev- 



THE TANNERY (concluded) 61 

enth tannery I have had purified by fire.' 

"Will you attempt to have it rebuilt?" I asked.' 
"The bright eyes fleished with a new fire; the erect form 
seemed to expand, and I was greeted with: 

* "By the Eternal, I am too old a man to be beaten in this 
way! The tannery will be rebuilt!" 

The paper further says that not only was the tannery 
rebuilt, but also all of the accessory buildings. Some of 
these were a boarding house, forty dwelling houses, a barn, 
store, and offices. They were all electric lighted and much 
attention was paid to the comfort and convenience of the 
workers. This was a great change from the methods em- 
ployed in Grand Lake Stream village. The Philips tannery 
was but one of four at that time owned and operated by 
Mr. Shaw. The yearly finished products from them all, 
said the "Sentinel" sold for $1,500,000. 



62 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

CHAPTER VIII 
Hinckley Township becomes Grand Lake Stream Plantation 

The F. Shaw and Brothers maintained the schools and 
the roads rather than pay the increased taxes that a planta- 
tion organization would necessitate. After the failure of 
the tannery the creditors, actuated by the same motives, 
promised and probably endeavored to meet this expense. 
The business dwindled, however; profits grew smaller and 
finally vanished, then losses followed. The last teacher 
employed by the trustee received but fifty per cent, of the 
wages due him. The people in the village made an effort 
to bear a part of the burden of maintaining the schools, but 
during the last years of the tannery their own financial con- 
dition was precarious. When it was attempted to raise 
money for school purposes by a popular subscription about 
eighty dollars were promised and forty actually collected. 
It was suggested that the school become a private one. Par- 
ents were to pay twenty-five cents a w^eek for each child they 
sent; some even promised to pay fifty cents. Only a few 
paid either amount, although all parents wished their child- 
ren to attend the school. Owing to this reluctance or in- 
ability to support a school there came a time w^hen there was 
none. The roads, never well cared for became abominably 
bad. It was, however, chiefly to make sure of a school in the 
village that a plantation organization was suggested and 
earnestly discussed. 

The plan met with much opposition at first. In the ur- 
gency of financial pressure the Company had been obliged to 
part with the immense stretch of w^ild lands of the Township. 
Mr. J. P. Webber of Bangor had become their possessor, 
and he was especially opposed to the proposed plan. It 
was understood in the village that he offered to pay toward 
school expenses three hundred and fifty dollars a year if the 
Township would continue in its unorganized state. In con- 
sequence of this offer, or supposed offer, at the first meeting 
of the voters to consider the matter, July 1896, nothing 



GRAND LAKE STREAM PLANTATION 63 

was done. Several months passed and the school question 
remained as before. Mr. Webber's large donation was not 
made. A new agitation for a plantation government arose. 
Elxpressing the wishes of a majority of the voters Arthur 
Fleming, C. C. Hoar and Willis B. Hoar petitioned the 
County Commissioners that action be taken for such a 
change in the Township's status. Their petition was grant- 
ed, and the following notice sent to Mr. Fleming early the 
next year. 
"State of Maine Washington County (ss) 

To Arthur J. Fleming 

Greeting — In the name of the State of Maine you are hereby 

required to notify and warn the inhabitants of Township 

Three, Range One, North Division, qualified to vote for 

governor, to assemble at the School House in said Township 

on Monday the 25th day of January at ten o'clock in the 

forenoon to act upon the following articles; 

To wit. — 

1st. To choose a Moderator to preside at said meeting. 

2nd. To choose a Clerk 

3rd. To choose three Assessors 

4th. To choose a Treasurer 

5th. To choose a Collector of Taxes. 

6th. To choose a Constable 

7th. To choose a Superintending School Committee and 

any other officers. 

Given under our hand at Machias this 15th day of Jan- 
uary A. D. 1897. 

S. G. Spooner 
J. B. Nutt 
Geo. H. Coffin 



County 
Commissioners' 



At this meeting the following officers were elected; 

James Spencer 

Arthur Fleming [Assessors 

S. A. Doten 



64 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

T. J. Calligan Treasurer 



Frank Bagley ) 

Geo. McDonald I ^^^''^^^^ 



es 



James Spencer 

T. J. Calligan \ Superintending School Corrunittee 

J. Merrill 



James Spencer 
A. J. Fleming 
S. A. Doten 



- Overseers of the Poor 



George F, Elsmore , Sealer of Weights and Measures 

Joseph Fleming Field Driver 

S. A. Doten , Surveyor of Wood and Bark 

W. B. Hoar Sealer of Leather 

> 

William H. Elsmore Inspector of Shingles 

Mr. C. C. Hoar was choosen clerk, and the above officers 
were sworn in the usual way before him, says the record. 
The meeting was then adjourned. 

The name of Grand Lake Stream was tacitly accepted 
for the new Plantation. A partial inventory of Plantation 
property in the book of yearly reports gives these statistics: 
Value resident real estate $ 4,726 

Value non-resident real estate 54,688 

Value resident personal estate 2, 1 79 

Value non-resident personal estate 1 69 

Total valuation 61,762 

There were fifty-two poll teixes, eighty pupils in the school, 
two hundred and twenty inhabitants, three hundred and 
fifty-nine hens and six dogs. 

Thus the new Plantation began its career humbly and 
without great wealth, but with great courage on the part of 
its few inhabitants. 

At the second Plantation meeting it was voted to raise 
four hundred and fifty dollars for a school, and one hundred 



GRAND LAKE STREAM PLANTATION 65 

and fifty dollars were added to this amount for books. it 
was also voted to raise two hundred dollars for repairing 
the roads and bridges. "By a vote the school committee 
was empowered to meike some arrangement for a place to 
have school by buying, renting or building, and report to 
the assessors who can call another meeting if necessary." 
This meeting was adjourned for two days. At its continu- 
ation it was voted to give the work of tax collecting to the 
lowest bidder, provided he could give "the required bond, 
otherwise to be given to the next lowest bidder." The list 
of bids is as follows; 

George G. Elsmore 4 cents 4 mills 

A. J. Fleming 4 cents 

Charles Fleming 3 cents 6 mills 

William Elsmore 3 cents 5 mills 

William Elsmore and Charles Flemitig failed to give the re- 
quired bond, and A. J. Fleming became the first tax collect- 
or of the Plantation. 

Pursuant the recommendation of the committee ap- 
pointed at the first session of this meeting the Plantation 
purchased and repaired the old school house built by the 
Shaw Brothers. This building, with all tannery property, 
had passed into the possession of the Shaws' creditors. Its 
purchase overtaxed the slender financial resources of the 
impecunious community. There was too little money left 
in its treasury to fully pay for the necessary repairs, and the 
roof was reshingled by volunteer labor. 

The first taxes raised amounted to seven hundred and 
forty dollars and ninety six cents. Mr. Webber refused to 
recognize the Plantation organization, and for a time with- 
held his taxes. In consequence the Plantation Found the 
utmost difficulty in maintaining its schools and in meeting 
the running expenses of its government, and upkeep. Its 
credit was so poor that sometimes supplies for the school 
were charged to responsible citizens instead of to the Plan- 
tation. 

On April 12th, 1897, a Board of Health was appointed 



66 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

by the municipal officers. |The members were: 

Stephen Yates 3 years 

Willis B. Hoar ~ 2 years 

George G. Elsmore I year 

This and all subsequent boards of health have found littley 
to do. 

On April 27th, of the same year the voters petitioned 
the Commissioners of Washington County to "take such 
measures as will be found necessary in the earliest possible 
time to lay out eoid build a road across the lands of John P. 
Webber as follows: Beginning at the eastern side of the 
Plantation near the residence of H. H. Miller, running a 
southwest course over the line of road traveled to the village, 
crossing Grand lake stream above the tannery, thence to the 
place known as the John Gower place — such road bemg a 
public necessity." This petition was signed by C. C. Hoar 
(the clerk) and eighteen others, and was granted. 

The Milford and Princeton road Will be recognized in 
this description, the only land exit or entrance of the village. 
Little or no money had been spent on it for several years, 
and its condition was exceedingly bad. The Miller resi- 
dence was on the eastern edge of the Township, .and the 
Grower place about a quarter of a mile west of the stream. 

On July 6th, 1900, a Plantation meeting was called to 
"instruct the assessors of Grand Lake Stream as to what 
they should do in relation to the N. S. Read property, known 
as Lakenwild, and the timberlands of Hinckley Township, 
owned by John P. Webber and son, all of which property 
has been sold for taxes." The assessors were authorized 
to "sell or convey to any party or parties any right which 
the inhabitants of said Grand Lake Stream Plantation now 
possess in any property that has been forfeited to the in- 
habitants of said Grand Lake Stream Plantation by reason 
of non-payment of taxes." 

In connection with this tax sale of the Webber lands 
there is a rather interesting incident. Mr. Alden D. Hall, 
a stranger in the village, paid the taxes (slightly over three 



GRAND LAKE STREAM PLANTATION 67 

thousand dollars) and secured a deed of the whole great 
property in the expectation of thus owninj^r it. Later when 
the differences between Mr. Webber and the Plantation 
were explained and settled the former redeemed his land, 
and Mr. Hall's venture came to naught. 

Since the organization, and particularly since the mis- 
understanding with Mr. Webber has been cleared, the Plan- 
tation has, with such help as the state gives, maintained 
good schools. The public lots set aside by Massachusetts 
in the deed of the Township given to Samuel Hinckley yield- 
ed in the first years after the organization $76.60 a year. 
According to a report of the state treasure! made in 1919 
the amounts credited to the Plantation from the sales of 
wood from these public lots are as follows: 

June 1, 1850 Counts/ Agent $192.49 

Dec. 25, 1850 County Agent 141.44 

May 1, 1850 Land Agent 112.25 

June 19, 1851 County Treasurer 160.64 



Total 606.82 

Debited 

Dec. 1, 1849 Expense County Agent $23.16 

June 19, 1851 Expense County Tr. 236.58 



Total . 261.74 



Balance 345.08 

A further credit of $5871.88 ^va?-. Hven the Plantation 
on July 1st, 1915. The principal at the present time there- 
fore is $6216.96. 

Mistakes have been made in this account. Thus in 
1897 interest on $345.08 at 6 per cent for forty-five years 
was illegally add'='d to the principal, and interest paid the 
Plantation on a Land Reserve fund of $1276.80. Thus 
while the Plantat'on actually received $76.60 a year it w^as 
entitled to but $20.70. These large over oayments of in- 
terest have now absorbed all of the $931.72 (6 per cent. 



68 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

interest on $345.08 for forty-five years) which had accumu- 
later during the years the Township was unorganized.* 

The right to cut grass and timber on these lots was first 
sold by the state to one Stephen Emerson in 1850. The 
lots set apart in the deed for the first settled minister and 
for uses of the ministry were in Hinckley, as in many other 
Townships, turned over to the uses of the schools. The 
Plantation now receives four per cent, yearly interest on 
this fund. 

In 1912 a class C High school was established in the 
much used school hall. In 1911 four hundred and fifty 
dollars were appropriated for repairs on the school house, 
and this included the expense of preparing the building for 
the new school. A small school in the Cass district was 
established soon after the Plantation was organized, kut 
this was discontinued in 1914 there being by that time no 
children in the district to attend it. 

In 1 9 1 it was necessary to buy a plot of ground for a 
new cemetery. A lot on the Milford road was chosen. It 
is nearly opposite the farm cleared by the Rev. Moses Gard- 
ner. It was cleared by Daniel Campbell of Prince Edward's 
Island in earlier days, later sold to Charles Tarbox and con- 
tains about three quarters of an acre of land. It cost the 
Plantation fifty dollars, fences and other improvements 
have brought the cost up to two hundred dollars. 

The Plantation has kept and put in good repair its 
roads. At present about nine hundred dollars are us- 
ually spent each year for this purpose. TTie Plantation 
raises one third of this amount and the state contributes two 
thirds. In 1913 a machine for grading the roads was pur- 
chased for two hundred and thirty-five dollars. Since 1912 



*For many years the Plantation was actually paid $67.97 annual 
interest, a wrong computation on a principal of $1,276.80. In, 
November 1908 this mistake was rectified by a payment to the 

tieasurer of the Plantation of $156.97 error of $8.93 for each 

year since 1899 and interest of $76.60 for the current year. 

It is believed that there mav have been cuttings from these lots 
between the years 1851 and 1915 not recorded. 



GRAND LAKE STREAM PLANTATION 69 

Charles P. W. Calligan has been in charge of road repairing 
and has done most excellent work.* 

In 1913 the Plantation bought a chemical, fire fighting 
machine, for which it paid three hundred dollars. 

The Plantation has never paid much for the support of 
its poor, and it has never been necessary to have a poor 
farm. In many years nothing has been raised nor spent 
for indigent persons. In one year the money thus used was 
but fifty cents; in another it was a dollar and a half. During 
the earlier and struggling years of the Plantation's existence 
the poor were a slight burden. In one of these years two 
hundred and fifty dollars were appropriated, but not quite 
all spent. In twenty years the whole amount used for needy 
residents has not been over a thousand dollars. This is 
partly due to the neighborly, even family feeling the people 
have for each other. By this time by much intermarriage 
they are nearly all related. Everybody helps whoever is in 
trouble, and such help is never considered a charity. 

The bridge which eventually replaced the one broken in 
1882 became unsafe. New stone piers were built in the 
fall of 1917, and it is hoped to have a steel floor laid over 
them in a few years. There is a temporary but substantial 
plank flooring there now. 

TTie political bias of the Plantation is shown by this ex- 
cerpt from the clerk's book. 

"In September elections for Governor, Senator, Repre- 
sentative and other officers twenty-eight votes were polled 
as follows: 



*It has already been told (Chapter V) how heltei" skelter was the 
selection of house lots in early days. Some houses stand wh^re 
the street should be; others nartly intrude upon public ^va^■<!. The 
following extracts from the Town Records are interesting. "It w^as 
^'oted that the town exchange a strip of land 3 rorls vmc1<» \vit-h I. D. 
Sprague to save putting a street through his house loL." March 1915. 

In March 1909 Abraham McArthur and othrrs petitioned that 
J^haw Street be opened south of Milford road. The road Tvav was 
occupied by cottages o^vned by Mr. Rose. A pr"»'ate way was ac- 
cepted in lieu of the public onei desired upon Mr. Rose's promise to 
maintain it free of expense to the village. 



70 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

Straight Republican 18 

Split Republican 2 

Straight Democratic 6 

Straight Prohibition 1 

Defective 1 

In March, 1917, values in the Plantation were as follows 

Resident real estate $1 7,660 

Resident personal estate 6, 1 90 

Non-resident real estate 87, 1 70 

Non-resident personal estate 2,970 



Total 1 1 3, 990 

Non residents have built five summer camps which have 
greatly increased the last two valuations. In 1917 there 
were sixty-seven poll taxes at two dollars each, thijfty-eirrht 
dog licenses at one dollar each. The highest amount ever 
raised by the Plantation in taxes was $3,55 7 in 1913. The 
lowest amount reported on the records was $450. This 
was raised in 1906. 

Many of the details here set down seem trivial and 
perhaps uninteresting — the small affairs of a small commun- 
ity. In them are seen, however, some of the deeper and 
more vital roots of American respect for education and law. 
The establishment of a town government, its many oflficials, 
its orderly process and its resources and expenditures are 
studies in American rural life and conditions. Despite im- 
provements the Plantation's financial standing has not yet 
reached a point w^here the strictest economy can be disre- 
garded, or even all needs supplied. The school house, 
for instance, is practically worn out, but there are no funds 
for a new one, or even enough to make all needful repairs. 






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LATER DAYS IN THE VILLAGE 71 

CHAPTER IX 
Later Days in the Village 

During the declining years of the tannery the population 
of Grand Lake Stream slowly dwindled. After the tan- 
nery's final breakdown there was an exodus that left the vil- 
lage about one half its former size. The census of 1900 
gives the population as two hundred and twenty-one while 
in more prosperous days there were nearly five hundred 
people here. 

The village property of the erstwhile Company, with 
the exception of the tannery and its site, was bought at a 
sheriff's sale by F. A. Wyman who paid, according to rumor 
by law services. Mr. Wyman sold houses and house lots to 
those residents who cared to risk their future in the appar- 
ently ruined village. These houses, it will be remembered, 
were small and poorly made. They were without paint 
inside or outside, save in a few cases where tenants had 
painted a room or two. All were without any but the most 
primitive conveniences. They now sold with a small plot 
of land at from fifty to one hundred and fifty dollars each 
according to the location and the amount of land. TTie 
original plan of the village provided for lots five rods a- 
cross the front and eight rods deep, or just one quarter acre 
of land, and nearly all of the lots sold by Mr. Wyman were 
of this size. A few of the earlier settlers had long owned 
their homes, and two or three had acquired sufficient land 
for farming. After this sale the shrunken village became 
one almost exclusively of home owners. The new propriet- 
ors improved their property according to their means and 
taste. Barns, ells, sheds, henhouses were made from the 
free lumber of the demolished tannery; new vegetable gard- 
ens were planted; a few fruit trees were set out; cows and 
hens w^ere bought. A few^ of the necessities of life w^ere 
thus secured, but money to procure others was difficult to 
obtain. The outlook was exceedingly dark. In this ex- 
tremity the natural resources and advantages of the spot 



72 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

were given a new consideration. During the hurly-burly 
of the tannery years some sportsmen still came yearly, T)ut 
the place was unattractive then. The salmon in the lake 
and stream were very plentiful, however. One of the older 
residents tells this story: 

"An old fellow in the tannery — w^orked from six to 
six — used to go up above the dam after supper with a 
cedar pole. He had pork rind for bait. He'd catch more'n 
he could carry home in no time at all — it's God's truth." 

In the canal boys w^ould "gig" salmon all day long. 
Big fish were often crushed in the mill wheels. 

"It was nothing for a sport to catch one hundred in a 
day," says an old lady who has been here since the summer 
of 1871. 

Energetic minds began to devise ways to attract more 
sportsmen hither. From the earliest village days certain 
housekeepers had opened their homes for the accommoda- 
tion of one or more of these periodical visitors. Mrs James 
Forbes,* w^ho w^ith Mr. Forbes came to the village from 
New Brunswick in 1874, Mrs. T. J. Calligan and Mrs Ben- 
jamin Fickett w^ere some of these housekeepers. Mrs. La- 
vonia Ripley's boarding house was the first one to make 
special provision for sportsmen. Her first home of logs 
was burned. A frame house was erected on its site and 
was one of the largest in the village. Soon after Mr. Bates 
(for a short time partner of the Shaw^s) left the place Mrs. 
F. A. Sym (Mrs George Sym) took the house built for him 
and turned it into a boarding house. She called this place 
the "White House." Following Mrs. Ripley's successful 
venture she too made special provisions for sportsmen. 
Several of them annually visited her. As early as 1893 
Mr. W. G. Rose opened a Sporting Camp. He called it 
"Ouananiche Lodge." The house formerly belonged to 
his father w^ho had been an occasional and favorite host to 
sportsmen. It is well situated on a knoll on the west side 

*In one of the earlier days of the village a bear came out of the 
woods from behind Mrs. Forbes' house, entered her kitchen, tipped 
over and broke her molasses jug and lapped up the contents. 



LATER DAYS IN THE VILLAGE 73 

of the stream, and is one of the few spots in the village from 
which the lake can be seen. After the collapse of the tan- 
tery Mr. Rose gave the business a new impetus. Many new 
visitors w^ere attracted to his camp. A number of small 
houses, formerly tannery property, were bought of Mr. 
Wyman, moved near it and renovated for sleeping quarters. 
After Mrs. Ripley's death Mr. Rose bought her house — 
which is opposite "Ouananiche Lodge" but on lower ground 
— and used it as an annex to the camp. He called it "Pio- 
neer Inn" in honor of Mrs. Ripley's pioneer efforts in pro- 
viding for the comfort of sportsmen. Eventually Mr. Rose 
organized the "Grand Lake Stream Company" to take over 
the business. Ex-Comodore E. P. Boynton of the Boston 
Yacht Club w^as made president, and Mr. Rose became 
secretary and manager. In 1918 the "Pioneer Inn" was 
sold to Alonzo Woodward, and so is no longer a part oF 
this camp property. " 

Mr. Stephen Yates was almost as early in the new busi- 
ness as Mr. Rose. Mr. Yates is a son of Samuel Yates, the 
first pioneer of Township 21. In 1895 he bought tlie 
"White House" of Mrs. Sym. The number of sportsmen 
yearly visiting it presently increased. After tw^o years, 
hoWever, Mr. Yates was obliged to give up business on ac- 
count of the poor health of Mrs. Yates. Mr. and Mrs. 
Frank Ball took the house September 1st, 1901. Mr. Ball 
came from Andover, Massachusetts, although for five years 
prior to this time he had been at the Duck Lake Club on 
Grand lake. Mr. and Mrs, Ball have enlarged the "White 
House," and built a number of small, attractive cottages 
and a garage. The camp is bne of the most popular in 
eastern Maine. 

Urged by former guests Mr. Yates, after a few years, 
opened another camp. This is an adaptation and enlarge- 
ment of one of the older of the village houses, and it is well 
located on the higher part of the easterly ridge that over^' 
looks the stream. He also has been obliged to build sup- 
plementary, small cottages. On April 30th, 1920, Mr. 



74 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

Benn Treadwell, of Tuckahoe, New York, bought this 
property and named it "Grand Lake Camps." New and 
attractive cottages are to be built. 

In September, 1907, the Grand Lake Hotel became the 
property of Mr. Alonzo Woodward of Springfield, Maine. 
In 1912 it was sold to Mr. Charles Bradford of Endfield, 
Maine. Sportsmen often stop here. 

Thus the village has turned from the humble task of 
providing sole leather for the world to the pleasanter task 
of catering to its pleasures and its health. The men are nearly 
all guides. They are experts in fish lore and woodcraft. 
In the winters they work in the lumber camps of the vicinity. 
Between seasons some of the more enterprising make can- 
vas canoes, ax handles and paddles. Some of the men 
are employed each season in log driving. The logs, hauled 
upon the ice in the winter and left to float when the ice 
melts, or yarded upon lake shores and rolled into the w^ater 
in the spring, are collected into booms at the head of Grand 
Lake and towed to its foot. They are then sluiced through 
the opened gates of the dam, and floated down the stream 
to Big lake where they are again collected into booms for 
the rest of their journey. Jams, which form in the stream, 
often test the muscles and nerves of the men who liberate 
them by the skillful use of pevies. 

The women and girls of the village are industrious pick- 
ers of the w^ild berries in which the Plantation is rich. In 
the summer they often help in the public camps, or in the 
private camps of summer residents. 

*Dr. Samuel Mixter of Boston built the first private sum- 
mer cottage in the village in 1 904. A year later Mr. Arthur 
Blake of Concord, Massachusetts, bought a small house of 
Frank Elsmore, then a resident here, and adapted it for 
summer use. Four years later it was burned to the ground, 
Mr. Blake then built a summer cottage, and acquired in ad- 
dition to the Elsmore lot three lots adjacent to it. In 1 9 1 

*The visits of Dr. Mixter and his sons have brought blessings 
to many afflicted folk here. No charge is made or care spared those 
who are ill. 



LATER DAYS IN THE VILLAGE 75 

this land and cottage were sold to Mr. J. B. McCoy of East 
Orange, New York. Since 1916 Mr. McCoy has been a 
permanent resident of the village, Mr. James T. Max- 
well of Saugaties, New York, built a summer home here 
in 1909, and two years later Prof. J. W. White of Harvard 
University and Mr. F. L. Atkinson of Newburyport, Massa- 
chusetts, each built cottages. Two sportsmen from Brockton, 
Massachusetts, L. C. Thomas and H. L. Allen, built a cot- 
tage on a small peninsula about two miles from the village 
on the east side of Grand lake. This cottage was built in 
1 907 and in 1914 sold to Mr. Henry Nickerson of Cohasset, 
Massachusetts. Mr. James Brite of New York now owns 
the old William Cass place. He built, in the summer of 
1919, a summer camp on Munson's Island, Grand lake. 
This latter camp is in Township 6 where it borders on Hinck- 
ley. 

The opening of the Washington County railroad in 1895 
has proved to be a factor in the new fortunes of the 
village. Travel hither from points west was, in the past 
days, roundabout, tiresome and expensive. It is now 
comparatively easy. In the spring travelers may, if they 
desire, still come in from Princeton by the old route over 
the lakes. A small steamer makes the trip daily when the 
water in Big lake is sufficiently high. Princeton is still the 
nearest railroad station, but the horse stage has been re- 
placed by a Ford car — save in the winter months, and the 
road is now kept in very good condition. 

Mr. Emmons Crocker who bought the remnants of the 
tannery and its site sold the latter to the Grand Lake Stream 
Company, and this company sold it to the St. Croix Paper 
Company, its present owners. In the general shifting of 
village property ownership at about the beginning of this 
century the Grand Lake Stream Company became posses- 
sed of the office and store building of the former tannery 
Company and the land upon which it stood. The stock 
of goods of the store was bought by George Elsmore and 
Charles Tarbox. These two conducted the business of 
storekeeping for several years. Then the partnership was 



v 



76 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

dissolved and Mr. Elsmore became sole proprietor. The 
building caught fire and burned to the ground on the night of 
November 2nd, 1913. The whole village was lighted by the 
flames. 

Some years before this fire, however, Mr. Elsmore ceased 
to have a monopoly of business. In 1 903 Mr. Willis B. Hoar 
opened a competing store for the sale of genereJ merchan- 
dise. Mr. Hoar came to the village in 1 88 1 and became an 
employe of the company, first in the tannery and then in its 
store. He began business for himself in a small building 
near the Gramd Lake Hotel and presently was obliged to add 
to it a large, front shop. 

The spring following the disastrous fire Mr. Elsmore 
erected a small building opposite the site of his former busi- 
ness and there for a short time resumed trade. In 1915 
Mr. Robert Sutherland opened a store in this building. Gro- 
ceries, dry goods, boots and shoes and hardware are all here 
as in the store of Mr. Hoar. Several other essays at store 
keeping have been of short duration and more or less suc- 
cessful. 

The Grand Lake Stream Compcmy erected a slightly small 
er building than the old tannery office building upon the 
site of the latter. In one end of it is a hall, in the other a 
store which has been intermittently occupied. It is now a 
billiard and pool room. TTie hall is the present place of 
many festivities. 

Mr. William Gollin is one of the business men of the 
place.He owns a small, gasoline powered sawmill, and also 
a store in which fishing tackle, candy and fruit are for sale. 
Mr. Charles Bradford is the owner of a portable sawmill. 

In the winter the village is a quiet place. TTie men are 
away cutting wood, a number of extra duties fall upon the 
women and money is none too plentiful. In the spring, 
summer and fall, however, there is a revivification. The 
men return to their homes, put by their axes and take out 
and prepare their canoes. In April the first sportsmen ar- 
rive. A little later a moving picture show begins its annual 
visits. Two or three times a week it comes to the village 



LATER DAYS IN THE VILLAGE 77 

and is said to take away weekly fifty dollars. These shows 
are interesting occasions when village folk and visitors eis- 
semble like one large family. The children gather in ani- 
mated groups well to the front, often sitting on the floor in 
a great circle between the settees and curtain. A wide man- 
tlepiece over the fireplace in the rear of the hall is usually 
occupied by several small boys. Bags of peanuts are freely 
passed around, and everybody has a good time. Frequent 
dances are given in this hall in the spring and early summer. 
Lady Washington's reel, Money Musk, Virginia reel and 
Portland fancy are still favorites here. The new dances 
however are not neglected. 

Fourths of July, in the last few years, have been cele- 
brated in the old fashioned manner. Water sports take 
place in the morning, foot races and novel contests of vari- 
ous sorts in the early afternoon. A ball game concludes 
the afternoon sports. There is dancing in the hall from an 
early hour in the afternoon until late at night. Ice Cream 
and other refreshments are for sale. Balloon men are in 
attendance with their gay colored wares. Fire crackers and 
pistols constantly pop. Automobile parties from the near- 
est towns come to the village, and, if the day is pleasant, 
there is ceaseless animation. 

A ball team was organized in the summer of 1920. 
Many Saturday afternoons during the summer have been en- 
livened by ball games. The team has been successful in 
its contests with neighboring teams. 

The Grand Lake Stream Company, Mr. Herbert Bacon 
and Mr. Everett Campbell own small excursion steamers. 
These, of course, are primarily for the use ot sportsmen and 
summer guests, but the village folk occasionally have fishing 
and picnic trips in them. A number of guides and summer 
residents have motor boats, and nearly every man in the 
Plantation has at least one canoe. The "Robert H.", 

named for and for a long time owned by Mr. Robert Souther 
land, is a large, stern wheel, freight boat of the same type as 
the Company's boats, the "H. L. Drake" and the "Fanny 
Bates." In 1919 this boat was purchased by the Eastern 



78 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

Pulpwood Company, rebuilt and renamed "Eastern." It 
is principally used in the spring and early summer to tow- 
logs. 

Now and then young people have gone away From 
Grand Lake Stream and acquired distinction or eminence 
elsewhere. Martin Butler was one of the first of these. 
After the accident in the tannery which cost him his right 
arm, he learned to write with his left hand. He became the 
publisher of "Butler's Journal," a weekly paper of Freder- 
ickton. New Brunswick. Fred Calligan, son of Mr. and Mrs. 
Thomas Calligan, has become a successful ranch owner in 
Washington State. 

It is to the people who spend their lives here that the 
strongest interest is attached, however. They possess the 
sturdy traits of the first pioneers of America. The condi- 
tions of their lives make them self reliant and unaffected in 
manner. Shut away from the rest of the world all winter, 
save for the slender ties of more or less regular mail, they 
are ready with a hospitable welcome for returning friends 
or for strangers when the fishing, vacation and hunting 
season comes again. The resident guides of the village are: 

Bacon, Elmer McArthur, George 

Bacon, Herbert McLoed, Fletcher 

Bagley, George Moore, William 

Bradford, Charles Kneeland, Harvey 

Brown, Bernard Smith, Ernest 

Brown, Earl Smith, George 

Brown, Edward Smith, Zealous 

Brown, George Sprague, Charles 

Brown, John Sprague, Joseph 

Brown, John V. Sprague, Raymond 

Brown, Seth Sprague, Stephen 

Brown, Truman Sprague, Vernor 

Brown, William Sprague, William 

Campbell, Everett Wheaton, Arthur 

Calligan, Charles White, Charles 

Chambers, Alexander White, Charles C. 




FISHING FROM A PIER 



LATER DAYS IN THE VILLAGE 79 

Chambers, Angus White, Fred 

Chambers, Benjamin White, Horace 

Elsmore, Eben White, William 

Gollin. William Whitehead, William 

Gould, Hill Woodward, Alonzo 

Gould, Frank Yates, Arthur 

Hoar, Paul Yates, Eugene 

Holmes, Arthur Yates, Irving 

Holmes, Frank Yates, Percy 

McArthur, Abraham Yates, Wallace 
Mc Arthur, Franklin 1 , .- 

With two or three exceptions every family in the village 
is represented here at least once. The names show the 
English or Scotch ancestry of practically every family. In 
addition to the guides here mentioned there will usually 
be a few more, Indians, former residents, or residents of 
nearby places, who come to the village for the fishing season. 



80 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

CHAPTER X 
Grand Lake Stream in the World War 

The village did its full share in the World War. One 
oi the first to feel and respond to its call was Ernest Smith, 
son of Mrs. Alonzo Woodward and grandson of one of the 
pioneers of Township 2 1 . He enlisted in the United States 
Navy in 1916 and was stationed on the U. S. S. "Kearsage". 

Alexander Chambers, great grandson of Mary Ann Cass 
Hold, and great, great grandson of David Cass, the Town- 
ship's first settler, enlisted in the Navy in March 1917. He 
was trained at the Naval station at Providence, R. I., and ser- 
ved on the ships "North Dakota," "Black Hawk," "New 
Mexico," and others. He was under Admiral Hugh Rod- 
man and saw much active service in French and English as 
well as in American waters. He was mustered out of the ser- 
vice on the 1 3th of October, 1919. 

Eldon Gould, son of Martha Yates Gould and the late 
Gorham Gould and grandson of the pioneersWilliam Gouid 
and Samuel Yates, enlisted in the Navy in May, 1917. He 
was sent to the Rhode Island training station and after- 
ward faithfully served as fireman on the ship "New Jersey" 
for the duration of the war. He died of diphtheria while 
still in service on this ship in April, 1919. 

Village boys to serve in the U. S. Army for the World 
War were: 

Hill M. Gould Infantry Camp Devens 
George M. McLoed (Corp.) Infantry Camp Devens 
Zealous A. Smith Infantry Camp Devens 
Ernest E. Sprague Infantry France 

William E. Turner Infantry Camp Devens 
Edward Arthur White Engineers France 
Oliver White Infantry Pordand, Me. 

Ernest Sprague was mustered into service on May 28th, 
1918. He was sent to Camp Devens. He volunteered 
for service in France and was sent abroad after less than 



IN THE WORLD WAR 81 

a month's training. He was a member of the 39th Infantry 
Regiment, Company A, 4th Division. 

Edward Arthur White also volunteered for service in 
France. After four weeks training he was sent abroad. 
He was assigned to Company C. 504th Engineers and 
sei'ved with his company until the end of the war. Neither 
of these boys received wounds. 

William Henry Medcalf, locally known as "Billy ", early 
won distinction in the war. The village has only a partial 
clakia to him, however. He lived here for several years 
when a small boy, then went with his parents to Dennys- 
viile. He later returned to the village and had been living 
here three years when the war broke out. He went at once 
to New Brunswick and enlisted in a Canadian regiment. 
He was sent to France early in 1915 and acrved contin- 
uously with a Canadian-Scottish unit until the end of the 
war — save for a few months when various wounds were 
healing in hospitals. He was several times recommended 
for gallantry in actaon. He has a Military Medal for risking 
his life to sit by a dying stranger in "no man's land" while 
shells were dropping around him, and machine guns were 
"beating their devil's tatoo." A bar, signifying additional 
citation for valor, was added to this medal. Later he re- 
ceived the Victoria Cross for "most conspicuous bravery, 
initiative and devotion to duty in attack." 

The village subscribed $8,000 to various Liberty Loans, 
and $2,400 in War Saving Stamps. Contributions of over 
$200 were made to the Red Cross relief funds in addition 
to the cost of the large quantities of material used by the 
women in sewing and knitting for that Society. 



82 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

CHAPTER XI 
Description of the Village 

"Just over the Maine border 

Some thirty miles or more 
From where the St. Croix empties in 

At Calais' sea girt shore, 
There stands amid the rock ribbed hills, 

Renowned for fish and game, 
The little town my heart still thrills. 

The town without a name." 

This verse is from a poem written by Martin Butler, 
called "The Town Without a Name." It is descriptive of 
the village. Yet the name Grand Lake Stream belongs to 
this spot as truly as its waters, its forests and its eiir belong 
to it. Since the days when an embryo village of sportsmen's 
tents rested periodically upon its uncultivated sods to the 
present days of civilized dwellings it has possessed it by 
natural endowment. 

Shortly after the Plantation was organized the following 
description was sent to the Secretary of State at Augusta. 
"Description of Grand Lake Stream Plantation: Eight 
miles north and south, six miles east and west, bounded 
as follows: North by Talmage, ecist by Indian Township, 
south by Number 2 7, and Plantation 2 1 , west by Number 6. 
The tannery and village are in the southwest corner at the 
foot of Grand lake. The road starts at the east side of the 
town and runs southwest across it to Number 6. There 
are a few farms situated on the road betw^een Indian Town- 
ship and the village." 

The village occupies but a small peu-t of this immense 
tract. The clearing, regardless of surveyor's plans, is 
about three quarters of a mile long and at the widest place 
one half mile wide. In all it contains about one half square 
mile of land. In addition to this open space there are the 
farms on the Milford and Princeton road. TTiese are the 



DESCRIPTION OF THE VILLAGE 83 

Cass farms, the Hawkins farm, the farm called by the Shaw 
brothers the Poor Farm and the one cleared by the Rev. 
Moses Gardner. West of the stream there are two small 
irregularly shaped fields. 

The clearing is nearly oval in shape. The dam stretches 
almost across its northern end. Beginning here in a tumul- 
tuous rush, as the water pours through the gate, the stream 
winds through the village in a narrow, shallow bed. The 
former ugly scar of the canal bank is now almost obliterated. 
Save for a short space just below the dam and another be- 
low the bridge the banks are well covered by trees and 
bushes. The current of the stream is rapid, and the fre- 
quent rips sparkle in the sunshine, or in dull weather make 
enlivening bits of foam. In summer the stream is a com- 
munity bath tub — auxiliary to the lake. It sometimes serves 
the humble purpose of wash tub. Many of the homes de- 
pend upon it for water for domestic purposes. It is like 
a beneficent and dominating personality, a vital factor of 
village life. 

Long, uneven ridges rise gently above both banks. On 
the sides of these ridges that slope toward the water most 
of the houses are built. Most of them face it, their backs 
turned to the encircling forests. The land is rocky and 
hilly, although the quality of the soil is good. Several 
springs bubble out on the hill sides and flow down to the 
stream. In summer some of these brooks become dry 
while in the spring they overflow their banks and make 
marshy places. From the dam, from some parts of the 
easterly ridge, from the knoll on which "Ouananiche Lodge" 
stands and from the road which straggles past it to "Tough 
End" the lake can be seen. On a fair day it stretches broad 
and blue with a far, hazy border of trees and low mountains. 
On a dull day it is veiled in leaden mist and obscurity. 
Looking in the other direction from Water street, or from 
the Treadwell and Ball camps, the stream opens a gap for 
the broad, blue top of Harmon mountain, sixteen miles 
away, to show behind the trees. Looking upward the sky 
stretches unobscured in a vast arch. Its edges visibly curve 



84 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

downward far behind the ragged lines of trees that shut the 
village into the great forest. 

In the winter much is changed. The evergreen trees 
show darker against the snow, and bare branches make an 
intricate brown mass, or stand out in fanciful relief from a 
white world. The sky seems lower :the roads are lined with 
snow banks, many paths branch out from them and lead 
to the houses. The lake is white with deep ice and snow. 
Even the stream is frozen save for a narrow space where the 
current is swift. 

Several logging roads bore straggling, sometimes inter- 
secting lines into the woods. In the fall when mosquitoes 
and black flies are gone these make pleasant walks. In the 
darker places are great beds of many varieties of ferns and 
in the less shaded spots are many wild flowers. Sumac 
blossoms, the red clusters of berries on the mountain ash 
trees, frost brightened blackberry vines and maple trees 
deck the forest greens. At this time too can be found beech 
nuts, the only nuts that are plentifr.l in the Plantation. 

In the spring and early summer there are places v/here 
the ground is almost literally covered with violets. Later 
come the wild cherry blossoms, mountain laurel, w^ild carrot, 
daisies, goldenrod and a great variety of wild flow- 
ers. Wild strawberries are very abundant and so too are 
raspberries and blueberries. The trees are chiefly pine, 
hemlock, spruce, fir, cedar, birch and maple. In leaser 
number are the beeches, larches, alders, willows, oaks, and 
elms. 

There are thickets by the stream from w^hich come var- 
ied and beautiful bird songs. Song sparrows, bluebirds, 
catbirds, w^ood thrushes and the shy hermit thrush are all 
here and many more besides. Swallow^s v/heel ceaselessly 
over the stream to catch the abundant flies. At night -whm- 
poorwills often call incessantly. At dusk night hawks fly 
about busily. In August there w^ill be a regular visitation 
of fly catchers. 

The air of the village is no"w clear and sweet. It fre- 
quently smells of pine trees, or the mingled odors of the 



DESCRIPTION OF THE VILLAGE 85 

many kinds of forest trees will permeate it, or sometimes, 
if the air is heavy, the pungent smell of burning wood comes 
down from the chimneys. One of the interesting features 
of the village is its wood piles. Every house has one, and 
some of them almost rival the house in size. Sometimes the 
woodpile is a stacked heap; sometimes it is a carefully ar- 
ranged pile. They are seldom under cover. Upon them 
the inhabitants depend not only for cooking fires, but to 
keep the winter's cold out of the houses. 

Two sorts of life mingle here, but are distinctly differen- 
tiated. A curious human mosaic is fitted snugly in the 
broad, green setting of the woods. Primitive America and 
the twentieth century are in actual contact. TTie women 
knit stockings and underwear at home, not only in Tvar times 
but at all times for family needs. Here are the biq: cata- 
logues of the famous mail order houses for an up to date 
market while the local stores carry groceries, naint, tin^vare, 
drygoods. boots and shoes and an incalculable number 
of other things. Here are primitive w^ell sw^eens, hnse niles 
of sawed and split stove wood, and in the houses braid- 
ed rugs, airtight stoves and water pails. Here are automo- 
biles while the community's forty or more cows feed at will 
by the roadside or stray for miles into the forests. Through 
the narrow^, durty roads, or over Indian hill by the blue- 
berry bushes, a? the diisk falls, the cov/? corpe home driven 
bv the taTiPcJ oft'*"* ^Trf>fo'>*''»d rK'Vlrpn. Co''Ar }-)(»]':; tinkle 
d'srordantlv, ^^^e voices of the children T'infi'le w^ith the 
crur'^le of the rios, the low roar of the dam and the son^fi 
and twitter of birds. The small rural proce<?sions pass 
other little processions of sportsmen, returning from a day 
upon the lake, conducted by guides who bend under the 
weight of luncheon baskets, coats, cushions and sometimes 
of nets saggmg with fish. So unaffectedly runs life, so 
outwardly peaceful is the villa??e it is hard to realize that 
here, as elsewhere, falls the chasteninrr, incorporeal rain 
that nurtures heart ache and discontent. 



86 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

CHAPTER XII 
Fish and Game 

"Stretching from the Penobscot to the St. Croix, the 
boundary line between the United States and New Bruns- 
wick, and from the Atlantic ocean on the south to an al- 
most unbroken wilderness on the north, Washington County 
is probably one of the finest fishing and hunting regions in 
this country."* 

This is still true. Grand lake and its stream are home 
waters for the landlocked salmon, the fish which the Indians 
called ouananiche. For seventy seasons at least sportsmen 
have tussled here with these lively fish. It is said that in 
the days of Grover Cleveland the fame of them reached 
even to the White House and but for an unexpected stress 
of affairs the village would have been visited by him and 
Joseph Jefferson. Many distinguished fishermen have been 
attracted hither. From shortly after the ice leaves the 
lake in the spring until the end of June salmon rise with ala- 
crity for the pretty, little artificial Hies that are cast to them. 
Again in September their appetite for these dainties revives. 
These are, of course, the especially favorable times for tak- 
ing them, but there is no day in the whole summer when by 
trolling on the lake with live bait they cannot be caught. In 
the stream are many pools where they lie concealed, but 
from which a skillfully thrown fly will lure them. Just 
above the dam fly fishing is also successful. In the proper 
season this is the place of greatest attraction in the village. 
As many fishermen will try their luck there as can find room 
on the piers. For each fisherman there will usually be a 
number of spectators. The interest and excitement of a 
"catch" never fail. 

The ouananiche, or land locked salmon, are a handsome, 
silver colored, dark spotted fish. They are strong and fight 
hard when hooked. The female, it is said, has the most 
beautiful and symmetrical contours of all fish. Salmon in 

•New York Tribune, August 27th. 1900. 




THE STREAM and SECOND HATCHERY. Taken a mic 1887 



FISH AND GAME 87 

Grand lake or the stream seldom weigh more than seven 
pounds, although in the summer of 1920 an eight and three- 
quarters pounds salmon was landed. The usual size of those 
caught is two or three pounds. It is estimated that sports- 
men stopping in the village and the home fishermen to- 
gether annually take about ten thousand of them. The lake 
is freshly stocked every year so that the supply never runs 
out. 

Next to the salmon the togue rank in favor. They 
are lake trout, and grow very large. A fish weighing thirty- 
two pounds has been landed according to the "Washington 
County Railroad Magazine." During this summer (1920) 
a nineteen pounds togue was actually landed. These fish, 
however, are rare exceptions to the rule. An eight or ten 
pounds togue is an excellent fish to catch, and larger than 
the average. Togue, unlike salmon, make no desperate 
fight for life. They will lie on the bottom of the lake and 
resist by their weight the pull of the line. They are often 
caught in the winter through holes cut in the sometimes three 
feet thick ice. Occasionally a salmon is pulled through 
these holes, but this is a difficult feat. Other edible fish in 
the lake are white perch, pickerel (which are often caught 
for the market) and a little, delicious fish, weighing from a 
pound to a pound and a half and called white fish. 
White fish have such tender mouths that a hook will tear 
out, but they are caught in great numbers in nets. 

"Sometimes," said a guide, "as rpany as seven hundred 
are taken in one net in a single night." 

They are caught in the spring and fall. A net, finely 
meshed and long, is stretched near the shore in a favorable 
place. The bottom of it is weighted with lead, and the top 
buoyed with cork. When the fish try to swim through it 
to the shallow water for food their fins are caught In the 
meshes of the net, and they are hopelessly entangled. Of 
course no "sport" indulges in this method of fishing, but for 
the home fisherman w^ho wishes to stock his larder it is most 
efficacious. When lightly smoked white fish keep for a 
long time. 



88 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

Some of the most successful fishers are hawks. These 
powerful birds fly over the stream in long, sweeping curves. 
Sometimes they hang suspended in the air, scanning the 
water, then suddenly swoop down, make a great splash and 
rise with a wriggling fish clutched in their claws. 

Years ago, before the Washington County railroad was 
built, and the Princeton and Calais railroad had no connec- 
tions to make with other trains, the leisure of the woods of- 
ten infected the engineer and conductor of the latter road. 
*They carried guns, and as they puffed along kept a lookout 
for game. If any w^as sighted the train stopped and a shot 
was taken. Once, so runs the legend, the conductor of the 
train shot and wounded a buck deer. The frightened ani- 
mal ran back along the track for several rods before it suc- 
cumbed and fell over the embankment. The excited spec- 
tators, passengers who had left the train to see the sport, 
hurried on board again, the engine was reversed and the 
train backed to the spot. The deer was hoisted on board 
and the train resumed its way to Princeton with everybody 
on it satisfied. 

No stops of this sort are now made, but deer are still 
plentiful in the whole region. So also are moose. In the 
fall a moose call given on the shore of Grand lake w^ill sel- 
dom fail to bring one or two of these big creatures into sight. 

The woods that are many miles deep on all sides of the 
village, save for the short open space of lake boundary, are 
still primitive although the trees are of the young generations 
that follow the woodman's axe. The decay and litter of 
ages are here. So too are mossy boulders, hills and hum- 
mocks, deep crevasses between frost riven rocks, brooks, 
trickling springs, deep shadowed thickets, dens of black 
bears and homes and haunts of hundreds of other wild ani- 
mals. 

All the gear of savagry, save only the wild Indians, re- 
mains. Even Mystery has left her eerie footprints on the 
leaf mold and moss for there is an "Injun devil" — long, 
gray, lithe, panther like — who lurks in the deep shadows. 
*Wa8hington County Railroad Magazine. 



FISH AND GAME 89 

Sometimes his blood curdling cry falls upon the ears of lone- 
ly campers, or of children strayed too far from the village; 
sometimes his pursuing shadow is seen on the lonely, night 
shaded roads of the region. He is doubtful game for the 
hunter, but the black bears are still so numerous that the 
state pays a bounty of five dollars for every one killed. 
They leave their dens by the end of March, or the first of 
April. Sometimes they are seen on the roads at a little 
distance from the village; sometimes a glimpse may be 
caught of one swimming in the lake. Few are captured by 
shooting. Trapping is the most successful way of taking 
them. A favorite method is to conceal a powerful steel 
trap in a slightly hollowed place beneath fallen branches 
and leaves. An appetizing morsel is tied on a branch over 
it. In attempting to reach the bait the bear falls through 
the rubbish that conceals the trap, and is caught in its jaws. 
To make his capture doubly sure the ground around the 
trap is sometimes pegged with pointed sticks. Directly 
over the trap will be the only soft spot on which to stand, 
and he will pick his way to it. Another and more primi- 
tive way of trapping bears which entails no outlay of money, 
but requires considerable work and ingenuity, is by the use 
of dead poles. This is the method the pioneer David Cass 
used. In taking the bait placed for him the bear liberates 
a heavy log which is suspended over it. It falls upon him, 
and breaks his back. Lately it has been discovered that 
spoiled oranges are a toothsome dainty w^hich he cannot re- 
sist. Phosphorus also has great attractions for him. After 
the first of June bear skins are not good so the trapping is 
done in the early spring. 

The lesser animals found in these woods and valuable 
for their fur are weasel (whose skin sells for errriine), Cana- 
dian lynx and Bay lynx, muskrat, mink, otter, red and gray 
'fox, (the latter rather rare), black or fisher cat and 
rabbit. 

It is estimated that at least five hundred dollars worth 
of furs are sold from the village yearly. These are in addi- 
tion to furs carried from here to Princeton whose annual out- 



90 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

put they help to swell to a value of nearly three thousand 
dollars. 

Big lake is one of the best places for duck and bird 
shooting in New England. Partridge, woodcock, black 
duck, pintail, green and blue winged teal, blue bill and simp 
are abundant in the lake. In the marshes are Tong legged 
blue heron and a few coot and rail. The presence of the 
latter bird is not generally known. 

Many ducks are also found on the inlets of Grand lake. 
Loons and sheldreikes are very common there. 



THE HATCHERY 91 

CHAPTER XIII 
The Hatchery 

The first fish cultural work in Grand Lake btream was 
begun in 1 868. At that time the Commissioners of Fish- 
eries of both Maine and Massachusetts conjointly collected 
a quantity of eggs of land locked salmon, or ouananiche. 
They matured them at a place in the woods half a mile or 
so west of the streeun where there is ^ spring. For three 
years work was done here without protection of any sort 
from the weather. In 1871 a rough log building was erect- 
ed over the spring. In the next year the United States 
Commissioner took over the care of the work. For some 
years this station was a sub-station of the Craig Brook 
Hatchery. Mr. Charles G. Atkins was in charge of the lat- 
ter place, and under him William Munson was fish culturist 
in charge here. Mr. Munson, it is interesting to note, was a 
nephew of the Ananijah Munson who lived by the stream 
for a few years in the Township's early days. 

Most painstaking work was done in the log building, 
although Mr. Atkins' report of it published in the "Report 
of the United States Fish Commissioner" says: "The 
site of the hatchery house is a very unfavorable one. 
Both spring and brook water can be used, but the brook 
is a tiny one, and in cold and dry weather shrinks to a very 
insignificant volume, while the spring issues from the ground 
at such an elevation from the swamp through which it flows, 
that at best we can barely get our troughs high enough to 
avoid flooding by freshets. Thus is there no opportunity 
of aerating the water by a fall, and the troughs must be 
placed upon a level with the floor, an unfavorable position 
for work .... No larger spring could be found in the neigh- 
borhood, there Was no clean and ample brook, and the 
water of Grand lake stream itself, though probably unsur- 
passed for such a purpose by any in the world, could not 
be used on account of certain physical difficulties which I 
saw no way of surmounting with the means at my disposed.* 



92 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

It was attempted to care for two million eggs at this 
small place. The work was well done and surprisingly 
successful, although owing to lack of room and proper 
conveniences many of the eggs were insufficiently nourished. 
"It was", says the report of Mr. Atkins in 1877, "finally de- 
cided to put Jn a temporary hatchery house on the west 
bank of the stream at the first fall below the dam. Even 
here we had a fcJl of but little more than ten feet and lia- 
bility to flooding by spring freshets. . . .The new hatchery 
house was a humble structure, only twenty feet by ten, 
but there was placed in it three troughs, each seventeen 
inches deep, which had an aggregate capacity of nearly a 
million eggs. Wire trays were employed about twelve 
inches square, nested in frames carrying twenty trays per 
frcune — the identical apparatus used at this establishment 
in 1875 and yearly since. The water was taken from the 
open stream through a covered plank conduct." 

The new hatchery was supplementary to the old one. 
It was experimental, but the success of it warranted the 
erection of a permanent structure by the stream in 1879. 
The new building was eighteen feet by twenty-two. It 
stood very near the spot now occupied by the summer 
camp of the late Professor J. W. White, It was used 
only to bring part of the eggs through their earlier stages 
of development. At this same time efforts w^ere also 
made to increase the supply of water at the old hatchery in 
the woods. Yet together these buildings proved inadequate 
for the work it was desired to accomplish. In December, 
1 880, a structure, designed as an addition to the first two 
buildings, was hastily erected in a small cove on the west 
side of the leike just above the dam. By another year the 
new building seemed so well located that it was enlarged. 
It was built upon the side of a steep incline, and had "six 
floors arranged in a descending series w^ith a floor space in 
all of fifteen hundred feet," says Mr. Atkins' reporr. The 
floors were cemented, and the stone foundation walls were 
from one to eighteen feet high. Mr. Atkins says of it: 
"The location of this hatchery is an exceedingly favorable 



THE HATCHERY 93 

one, and it is a matter of regret that the facilities existing 
at this point were not discovered at the institution of the 
establishment. The ground was, in its original condition, 
heavily strewn with boulders, large and small, and beneath 
them were interstices through which the water of the spring 
stole away in such measure as to give the impression that 
the supply was not only small but inconstant. It was only 
after the tangled maze of shrubs was torn away and part 
of the surface earth removed that the permanent character 
of the spring could be observed." 

Besides the expected plentiful supply of water there 
were other advantages of the new station. Mr. Atkins 
further says: "I make no doubt that all the serious losses 
which during the earlier years occasionally befell the stocks 
of eggs in development and transportation might have been 
avoided had we then possessed the facilities of Hatchery 
Number Three. Among the minor disadvantages which we 
might have escaped may be mentioned the labor and risk of 
carrying the eggs by hand from the fishing grounds over a 
half mile of rough road, often by night, the difficulty of 
guarding well the property so far out of sight and hearing, 
and the many weary days spent by Mr. Munson in the trans- 
fer of the young fish from the house to the stream in the 
month of June amid tormenting clouds of mosquitoes and 
black flies. This will henceforth be the headquarters for the 
establishment. Here the eggs will be packed for shipment, 
and the reserve hatched." 

These headquarters, when completed, comprised a sup- 
erintendent's cottage, a small ice house and a woodshed as 
well as the main hatchery. It was originally intended to 
buy the land on which these buildings stood. An option 
was secured, but at this juncture the final collapse of the 
tannery occurred. There was some confusion in the subse- 
quent sale of the village property which had belonged to 
the Company (of which this site was a part). The Grand 
Lake Stream Company became the owner of it. The 
buildings passed with the land to the new ow^ners, and in 
consequence of this miscarriage of its plans the Govern- 



94 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

ment now pays a yearly rental for the use of the premises. 
Work was suspended in this hatchery from 1892 to 
1897. In the latter year needed repairs were made and 
work resumed. By that time it had been discovered that 
the sanguine hopes of aji adequate water supply were badly 
founded. The spring proved to be inconstant. A new 
site was finsJly selected almost where the Company's saw- 
mill once stood. A dam was put across the end of the 
canal there, and an unstinted stream flows over it and 
through a wooden conduct to the troughs where the finger- 
lings cure kept. This hatchery was begun on Sept. 12th, 
1906, and has since been used with success, although the 
building is smeJI. 

Eggs are teiken in November. The work lasts about 
three weeks. The report of 1877 gives 2,159,000 as the 
number obtained in that year. Of these 470,000 were 
hatched for Grand lake. The rest were shipped to other 
places in the country. In 1887 there were taken 865,834 
eggs, and 208,000 were hatched for the lake. In 1897 the 
number of eggs tciken was 289,662. 1 1 4, 1 7 1 fry were 
hatched from these for this lake. These were retained in 
the hatchery until they were fingerlings before they were 
liberated. In 1907 there were taken 610,000 eggs and 
59, 740 were retained for this lake. A slight idea of the 
work of the station is thus obtained by these figures for 
one year in each of several successive decades. In 1900 
there were 33,862 fingerlings liberated in the lake. This is 
the smallest contribution ever made from the hatchery to the 
lake. The largest was in 1902 when 429,765 fry and 
58,835 fingerlings were liberated. 

In the later part of April the eggs — probably from 
eighty to eighty-five per cent, of the whole number — hatch. 
The spawn are in condition for shipment in February. 
They are packed in cases of dry moss, and usually arrive at 
their destination in good condition. The fry grow to be 
fingerlings in about four months. They are put in the lake 
in the October following the April in which they are hatched. 

In some of the earlier years the hatchery was supported 



THE HATCHERY 95 

by contributions from the United States Government, and 
from a few individual states. Thus in 1877 the United 
States gave $1,400, Massachusetts $500, Connecticut $300, 
and New Hampshire $200. Each contributor received a 
proportionate ratio of the eggs, after twenty-five per cent, 
had been reserved for Grand lake. In some years Maine 
was a contributor to the maintenance fund; in some New 
Hampshire and Connecticut did not contribute. In later 
years the United States Government has borne the entire 
expense of the hatchery. The station has been placed under 
the charge of the Green Lake hatchery. 

Since 1912 thirty-five per cent, of the eggs taken have 
been reserved for this lake, TTie other sixty-five per cent, 
of eggs are given by the United States to applicants whose 
requests are considered worthy. Since the establishment 
of the hatchery here eggs from it have been shipped to var- 
ious Icikes and ponds in the middle west and to places in the 
more northerly of the southern states. They have also 
been sent hence to France, Germany, England, Japan and 
other countries. They make these long journeys without 
serious injury, and are then successfully hatched. 

It is said that some time ago a United States Army officer 
who had fished in this lake visited Japen. A fishing ex- 
pedition was arranged for part of his entertainment there. 
He landed a fish whose plucky fight and appearance seemed 
familiar. 

"It's a land locked salmon from Grand Lake Stream, 
Maine," explained the Japanese official who accompanied 
him. 

The hatchery has been especially fortunate in the men 
selected to care for it. They have all been not only good 
fish culturists, but well liked residents of the village. Some 
of them have lived here several years. Mr, William Mun- 
son remained in charge until about 1 904, William Drummy 
of the Green Lake hatchery then took his place and remain- 
ed here until October of the next year, Mr. W, O, Buck 
was the next culturist in charge, remaining until 1909. He 
came here from the Craig Brook station. Mr. John A. 



96 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

Story, also of Craig Brook took his place, beginning his 
duties in November 1909. He was transferred to the 
Green Lake hatchery in the spring of 1906. Mr. Frederick 
Foster of the Saratoga, (Wyoming) hatchery succeeded 
him and in February 1919 was himself succeeded by Mr. 
Story who was returned from the Green Lake hatchery. 

Mr. Wallace W. Yates began work as assistant in 1904 
and has rendered most valuable service since that time. Mr. 
Yates is a nephew of the pioneer Samuel Yates. 



LATER INDIANS 97 

CHAPTER XIV 

Later Indians 

The pressure of white settlers slowly restricted the 
Indians until by 1 866 the remnants of the Passamaquoddy 
tribe had nearly all been gathered in two settlements — one 
at Pleasant Point on the bay, and the other at Peter Dana's 
Point on Big lake. Parties of these Indians still make the 
annual migrations up into the Grand leike neighborhood. 
They usually come soon after the ice leaves the lake in the 
spring. A favorite camp site is the slope facing the stream 
on the eastern ridge, and in the northern end of the village. 
This spot is called Indian hill and on it is a little portable 
house given to the Indians some years ago by a visiting 
sportsman. Some of the Indians paddle up the lake a little 
way and camp on its eastern bank. Formerly they stayed 
in these camps the whole summer long. More recently their 
visits have lasted but a few weeks in the spring. 

Squaws, in the earlier days of the village, used to wear 
a skirt and a loose sack. The skirt was made of three 
widths of cloth sewed up straight and gathered at the waist. 
When one of them acquired anything new it was put on over 
these garments. Nothing was discarded until it dropped 
off. In course of time some of the squaws were incased 
in many layers of clothes — none of them undergarments. 
The latter were not an Indian fashion. No matter what 
the weather they always added to their costumes a heavy 
woolen shawl. It was folded cornerwise and the tip trailed 
on the ground behind them. A red cotton handkerchief 
tied over the head was the last and picturesque touch to the 
toilet. 

The men wore any old clothes they could get and as 
many as fortune allotted them. They would make excur- 
sions into the woods to gather materials to manufacture 
paddles, tables of alder fancifully twisted and topped with 
birch bark, small boxes of birch bark — prized by house- 
wives as receptacles for salt, soda, spices, coffee, tea and 



98 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

other things — and baskets. In the earlier village days 
their baskets were usually coarse and heavy, such as clothes, 
market and bushel baskets. At that time they were often 
swapped for provisions. A clothes basket would be ex- 
changed for a peck of potatoes, a fair sized basket given 
even for a cup of sugar. Later they learned to color their 
splints and to make more fanciful and lighter sorts, and also 
to make the beautiful sweet grass baskets. Before canveis 
canoes came into use all those used on the lake were Indian 
birch bark canoes. They were made of a single flawless 
piece of bark. It was often a day's search in the mosquito 
and black fly infested forests to find such a piece. Articles 
manufactured here were taken as far as Caleiis and Eastport 
in search of customers. 

The Indians are now much better clothed than formerly, 
and this is largely due to the better prices that their baskets 
bring. Each of them receives two annual dividends from 
the state which together amount to about a dollar and a half. 
The state maintains schools at each point, looks after the 
poor, pays a bounty on all crops raised and otherwise 
eissists them. These Indians have been Catholics since the 
days of the Jesuit Missions in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick 
and at the mouth of the Penobscot river. Some of those 
who know them best, however, think that they still have a 
lingering faith in the old manitous. When Klooscup, the 
first man and master of all things, was deprived of his high 
estate by the Jesuits the old Indians said and believed that 
he retired to an island in the far north. He is still there, 
making a great number of bows and arrows with which the 
white people are sometime all to be destroyed. Then the 
Indians will again own the earth, and all will be as it was. 
*The Passamaquoddies, more than any other group of the 
Abenaki family, have retained early traditions and legends. 

Peter Dana, for whom the point on Big lake was named, 
was governor of this branch of the tribe about seventy-five 

*Sylvester, in his "Indian Wars of New England" makes this 
statement. The meaning of Abenaki is said to be The People of the 
Morning, or of the First Light, 



LATER INDIANS 99 

years ago. He is remembered as a powerful man of un- 
usual wisdom. Captain Lewey, another chief, and for 
whom Lewey lake was named, was also a notable member 
of the tribe. He is said to have been the first settler of 
Princeton which for a long time was called Lewey's Island. 
He was a tall, stalwart man with features typically Indian, 
and he and his sons were very proud of their undiluted 
Indian blood. He was enterprising and in an age and vicin- 
ity when much drinking was the rule reasonably sober. At 
times he was a lumber contractor, and sometimes he acted 
as boss of a gang of river drivers. In the latter capacity he 
worked for a dollar and a half a day w^hile the men under 
him were paid two dollars. When he was asked how this 
happened he said it was worth a half a dollar a day to be 
boss. He was very honest. To prove that he could borrow^ 
money without security he did, one morning, borrow from 
a bank where he was known, two hundred dollars without 
security. He carried it in his pocket, frequently taking it 
out to display it. until just before the bank closed when he 
deposited it. These are but two of the stories told of him. 

His son Athien is also favorably remembered. He 
farmed and guided and when he died, August 31st, 1899, 
he had a substantial bank account. 

Another of the notable governors was Joe Pierpole. 
The following story is told of him: Government officials 
were visiting the point when one of them asked him to name 
three wishes. 

"By jolly," said he after some reflection, "I wish Big 
lake all rum!" 

"What next?" he was asked. 

TTie old fellow scratched his head. "Have St. Croix 
river all rum too," he answered triumphantly at last. 

"And last, Capt'n?" 

This required sfeill mjore cogitation, but at length his 
mouth distended in a seraphic smile. 

"Have more rum," he said. 

He often came to Grand lake and acted as guide to 
visiting sportsmen. Other Indians to act as guides in for- 



100 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

mer days were John Newel, Nicholas Lola and two brothers 
called after the Indian fashion Tomah Joe and Gabriel 
Tomah. These guides were sometimes great story tellers. 
Gabriel Tomah was especially gifted in the art. Two of his 
stories and others of more or less local interest are in the 
appendix of this book. 



THE SEWING CIRCLE, THE CHURCH 101 

CHAPTER XV 

The Sewing Circles and the Church 

The history of the village sewing circle seems like an 
irregular flow and ebb of tide. Sometimes its activity has 
been very high; sometimes it had fallen very low indeed. 
It has never ceased to exist, however. The responsibility 
of earning a part of the minister's salary has kept it alive, 
but it has taken other and more especial objects to arouse it 
into great endeavor. Sometimes it has been diivided into 
two circles, each with bylaws and a name. Nevertheless the 
same devoted women have worked for unselfish ends how- 
ever they were named, or divided. The only real change 
has been when daughters have taken the place of mothers 
whom age, ill health or death have retired from its roll of 
workers, or when an occasional new comer in the village 
has taken a place in it. Since the settlement of the village 
the women have pushed to completion many enterprises. 
They raised money to build the cupola on the school house, 
and to buy and hang the bell in it. They also paid for a 
fence around the old cemetery, and they bought a carpet 
for the platform in the school house hall. All of these things 
have been accomplished by selling the work of their needles, 
and by the proceeds of periodical suppers. At length at 
was determined to undertake the really valorous project of 
building a church. Perhaps it will be remembered that 
the first religious services were held in the log school house 
where Mrs. Sprague taught. After the Shaw brothers built 
the frame school house services were held there. The school 
house had always been used for a great variety of secular 
purposes. Lodge meetings, dances, town meetings and 
nearly every sort of social gathering were held in the hall 
under its hospitable roof. A growing discontent that it 
should be the only place in the village for religious services 
culminated in this resolve of the women that a church should 
be built. To many residents of the village there had often 
come visions of a church which should stand in their midst, 



102 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

a token of their reverence, an inspiration for good lives and 
service. It was the women w^ho at last had the courage 
and force to transmute the vision into a reality, aided, how- 
ever, most generously by many of the men. 

The circle was suffering one of its periodical divisions, 
and was lasping into semi-apathy when it was reanimated 
by the forming of plans for this accomplishment. Ten of 
the indomitable ones of both circles became the founders 
of a new circle which they called the "Church Benefit Lea- 
gue." In a short time other members of the two partly 
disintegrated circles were attracted to it, and an unusually 
plucky campaign to raise money was begun. The League 
naturally encountered some opposition, much scoffing and 
skepticism, but nothing discouraged its members and help- 
ers. Inspired by the energy and zeal of Mrs. Lucinda 
Sprague, Mrs. Hannah Holmes, Mrs. Evie Moore and many 
others the women gave weekly suppers at the homes of 
different members of the League; they made and sold 
aprons, dresses, shirtwaists, patchwork quilts, braided rugs, 
knitted socks, mittens, gloves and underwear, and some of 
the women, after helping at all of these things and looking 
after their own households as well, found time to scrub. 
The school house was cleaned from top to bottom; the store 
where the dirt of the old tannery days still darkened the 
wood, was treated to rejuvenating applications of soap and 
w^ater, and the dirt of carpenters, masons and other w^ork- 
men was cleaned from a new camp. All of the money 
earned in these ways was turned into the church fund. These 
gifts of time and strength w^hich busy wives and mothers 
gave to do this work should count greatly in the total of 
gifts that eventually paid for the church. 

The weekly suppers netted the League from ten to 
fifteen dollars each. Sometimes a supper was given in the 
school house hall. For these occasions beans were baked 
in the ground in the old fashioned w^ay. A Fourth of July 
dinner given out of doors netted them fifty dollars. A patch- 
work quilt in which each woman wrote her name in the 
square which she made was sold by ten cent tickets and 



THE SEWING CIRCLE. THE CHURCH 103 

brought in thirty dollars. Thus little by little the funds 
grew, and belief in the project grew also. Subscription 
papers were teiken around. Nearly everybody in the Plan- 
tation was ready and willing to give. Still a few scoffers 
remained. 

"De money, it is not in town. You have not enough 
to de nails buy," said one of these, called Little Pete, the 
Dane. "But," he added, to emphasize his disbelief, "you 
build de church, and I will de pulpit buy." The promise 
was not kept. 

The League raised $1,635.90 by the sheer force of the 
practical genius of its members. The Congregational Build- 
ing Society of New York lent an additional sum which en- 
abled the village to have its church. Several generous do- 
nations and gifts helped to complete it. 

The "Minute Book" of the church records that on 
March 29th, 1904, "the plan to build a church took root." 
This was shortly after the collapse of the tannery, and in 
perhaps the most discouraging period in the village's history. 
Therefore the League's achievement is especially note- 
worthy. On July 1 1 th, four months after the work of 
raising money was begun, the sod was broken for the build- 
ing, and two days later the church was organized. On 
July 1 7th, the cornerstone was laid, and on September 1 8th, 
of the same year ( 1904) services were held in the unfinish- 
ed building. On Christmas day Sunday school was held 
in the finished vestry. The building was completed in the 
following September. Its approximate cost was two thou- 
sand dollars. It is called the Union Congregational Church. 

Ministers in the village have almost without exception 
been theological students and engaged for the summer only. 
Usually there has been a different minister each summer. 
In the earlier days a few of these student ministers were 
boarded around. Latterly the parish, which is practically 
the whole village, has paid their board at some private 
house, or at the Grand Lake HoteU In the winter 
religious services consist of Sunday school and Christian 
Endeavor meetings. 



104 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

By continued effort the women have helped to pay the 
running expenses of the church. Shortly after its organiza- 
tion a society of children caUed "The Busy Bees" earned 
money in many ways for it, and helped materially toward 
the purchase of its first organ. Later another organ was 
earned by "The Drama Club." This club went to Prince- 
ton, Topsfield and Alexander to give plays in order to raise 
money for this gift to the church. 



Yet another high tide in the circle's life rose in 1914. 
This was when the project of a woman's building arose. The 
work of the circle had always been made difficult by the 
lack of a sufficiently large and convenient meeting place. 
The attendance at the fortnightly suppers held in the too 
small dining rooms of members w^as becoming slender. 
There was no good place for the sale of aprons and other 
needle products. The school hall, now converted into a 
high school, was no longer available for these purposes. 
Various expedients had been suggested, but to all of them 
there were serious objections. At length a few of the more 
energetic of the women resolved to have a building for 
themselves. The old circle was reformed and named "Old 
Fashioned Sewing Circle." A meeting was held at the 
home of Mrs. Ruth Wheaton w^ith twenty-five mem- 
bers present. Mrs. Wheaton was elected president, and be- 
came at once the leader in an energetic campaign to raise 
money for a Circle Hall. A new round of suppers was giv- 
en for ten and fifteen cents a plate, more aprons and child- 
ren's garments were made, knitting done. HoHday and 
other sales of home made candy, cake and ice cream were 
undertaken. A small building fund was thus obtained. 
Of course the circle regularly contributed from its earnings 
to the salary of the minister, and to other church expenses. 
After two years of endeavor the women had accumulated 
$295 for their building. Like the w^omen w^ho pushed 
through the church project they met much opposition. It 
was even greater, in proportion to the undertaking, than 
that which had met the earlier and larger project. Nothing 



THE SEWING CIRCLE, THE CHURCH 105 

turned the "Old Fashioned Circle" from its purpose, how- 
ever. Interested persons and visitors to the village contri- 
buted sums varying from ten to one hundred dollars. Mr. 
Webber gave them permission to cut five thousand feet of 
lumber from his woodland, and the St. Croix Paper Com- 
pany of Woodland gave them a rent free lease of land 
upon which to erect the building. 

The hall was built in the fall of 1 9 1 6. It is a plain, one 
story and a half structure, but comfortable and large enough 
for all circle activities. It is homelike and cozy and furnish- 
ed with the essentials for circle work, although its owners 
hope to add something to its finish and its conveniences. 
It was opened and a supper and a sale held on Christmas 
eve, 1916. Mr. Robert Black, theological student who 
served as minister during the summer of 1917, contributed, 
during that summer, the labor of putting two coats of paint 
on the outside of the building. 

A branch of the Red Cross Society was formed in 1917, 
chiefly from circle members. AU possible time was given 
to knitting and other war work, and so the finishing touches 
the women intend to give their building have been post- 
poned. 



106 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

CHAPTER XVI 

Witteguergangum 

Little of Witteguergaugum, or Grand lake, lies in the 
Plantation of Grand Lake Stream. Its southeastern extrem 
ity and Dyer cove are here, but the vast body of the lake lies 
in Township 6. The lake is, however, the natural com- 
pletion of the village. It is to it as the door yard and gard- 
en are to a house. It is a source of recreation and of pro- 
fit. The village, inclosed in a narrow space by the green 
walls of deep forests, would seem cramped without, this 
wide, opened space beyond its tapered northern end. While 
more of Big lake than of Grand lake lies in the PlantatSon 
the former is too far away from the village to be in any sense 
a part of it. 

Grand lake is twelve miles long and from four to ten 
miles wide. The government has never surveyed it, but 
many soundings have been taken by guides. Its depths 
have in this way been estimated to be in places two hundred 
feet and even more. The water is clear and exceptionally 
pure. Farm, Whitney and Dyer coves are broad arms 
which stretch to the south, north and east respectively. 
Many smaller coves dent the shores between them. Farm 
cove mountain, the low range called Whitney cove moun- 
tains and Pineo mountains make a pretty, irregular sky line 
which begins to the southwest and extends across the north 
and well to the east. These hills are variously estimated 
to be from three to five hundred feet in height. Despite 
the w^ork of wood cutters they are covered with a thick 
growth of trees. The dark color of pines, spruce and hem- 
locks made eccenttic shaped spots on the more plentiful 
deciduous trees, or raise grotesque tops above them to be 
silhouetted against the slope of the sky. The shores also 
are all thickly wooded although here and there a narrow 
opening marks the site of an old logging road, or the winter 
hon^es of wood cutters. Sometimes deer, moose and even 
bears are seen in the openings. The few summer camps of 



WITTEGUERGAUGUM 1 07 

sportsmen show so indistinctly through the trees that the 
shores have a lonely, uninhabited look. 

In 1 905 the St. Croix Paper Company of Woodland ob- 
tained a right to flood the lake. The water is now seven 
feet or more higher than its natural level. Some of the 
natural beauties have, in consequence, been lost. Sandy 
beaches are covered; many trees at the water's edge are 
dead. The latter are now a fast disappearing fringe of 
gray, lifeless trunks and branches, some leaning, some still 
standing erect. They are phantom trees in the gray light 
of fog or storm, unsightly litter in sunshine. Presently, 
however, they will all have been swept away in the current, 
and perhaps new beaches will form. 

More serious than these devastations are the slightly 
submerged islands On some of them clumps of dying trees 
still stand or lean, on others a few rocks or stumps rise above 
the water and on others there is no mark. These shallow 
places are well known, however, and no serious accidents 
have occurred no matter how dark or foggy it may have 
been. There are many islands that are not submerged. 
Bear island is the largest of these, and the next largest l^ 
Marks' island (named for Colonel Marks who bought the 
Township from Judge Hinckley). The third largest island 
is Hardwood. 

The lake seems to be a bed of tumbled rock wreckage. 
Heaps of broken, water worn rocks rise in jagged peaks a- 
bove the water, usually near the shore, but sometimes far 
out in the lake. Immense ledges line some of the shores, 
and great boulders jut out from the trees and bushes. Hoary 
and grim one boulder rises out of the water a hundred or 
more yards from the shore and well up on the western side 
of the lake. It is called Caribou rock because many years 
ago the pioneer, William Gould, is said to have seen a car- 
ibou upon it. It has a sullen, crouching attitude as if wait- 
ing for some great chance while the pageants of thousands 
of years pass before it. Perhaps it is a drift boulder, and 
came down from the north in a slow glacial procession, or 
it may have slipped from a neighboring hill long before 



108 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

even the Indians were here. Gulls lay their eggs in the 
slight hallows of its passive back and leave them there for 
the sun to hatch in often misplaced confidence in eagles, 
owls and hawks. 

The pretty, fresh water gulls wheel and circle over the 
lake, or edight on the rocks where they look strangely 
large. Loons swim about in the water, or lift inquisitive 
heads to steure at passing boats. Occasionally they make 
their queer, wild, soprano cry. AU summer long flocks 
of sheldrakes frequent the lake. It is an amusing thing 
to see them hurry in front of a motor boat without having 
the wit to swim to one side of its path. 

On a summer afternoon the lake is all glittering blue 
color. Off to the north and west the shores are a hazy, 
luminous blue. The southern shores slightly take the tint 
from the sky and water and melt their deep green into the 
blue lake world. The lake is so large that steamers, motor 
boats and canoes scarcely disturb its solitude. Usually a 
few white clouds ride lazily across the sky, or mass over 
the tops of the trees near the horizon. Often the breeze 
will stir the tops of the waves into responsive white flecks. 
Thunder showers usually come down across the lakes to the 
village. The lightning can be seen streaking the sky, or 
darting down into the tree tops, but the thunder is moder- 
ate. The hills are too low for long reverberations. 

The Plantation leases from the Grand Lake Stream 
Company landing privileges on the easterly side of the lake 
above the dam. It was here that the Company built its 
wharf. It gradually fell into a state of dilapidation. A 
row of boat houses rose upon some of its foundations. At- 
tempts at repairs, sufficient to prevent accidents, were made 
occasionally by guides. At length, however, so little was 
left of it that the Pleuitation raised $800 dollars to build 
a new wharf. Stone foundations were laid and a plank 
floor laid over them. So swift is the current and so vio- 
lent the action of the ice in the spring that frequent repairs 
are necessary. 

Besides the boat houses near the wharf directly opposite 



WITTEGUERGAUGUM 1 09 

it on the western shore are more boat houses, another land- 
ing privilege and the third hatchery. The thick woods ad- 
join these thin ends of the village. Above the dam the 
Icike is very narrow. Properly this is a part of the stream. 
It broadens gradually for about a mile, and then expands 
into the lake. 

There is a legend which says that an Indian family once 
lived near Farm cove mountain. It was after the French 
Jesuits had led the Indians into the safe folds of the Catho- 
lic church. The head of the family was a zealous convert. 
One beautiful Sunday morning two members of his family 
wished to paddle on the still, shining lake. They were for- 
bidden the pleasure. It was a holy day, said the father, 
and therefore wicked to paddle on the lake, but his child- 
ren refused to obey him. So the Great Spirit punished 
them. He changed their bodies into swans, and sentenced 
their spirits to paddle each night forever on the lake. It 
is said they have been seen by lumbermen — two white fig- 
ures in a white canoe paddling around and around an 
islaind near the cove. 

The End. 



no HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 



The following poem was written by Mr. Orington Brown 
of Princeton who has called himself the "Burnt Land Poet." 

Old Musquash Bridge 

I was thinking today of the grand old way 

And my heart was lonely and sad ; 
But I'll give to the wind all sorrow, and sing 

A song that will make you glad. 

I will cast on the air all sorrow and care 

And sing you a diflFerent lay. 
I'll tell, if old Musquash bridge could speak, 

What the old wooden span would say. 

If old Musquash bridge could speak 

It would tell of the olden days. 
Way back in the year of seventy one 

From then to the present days. 

If that old wooden bridge could speak 

It would tell of many a sail. 
Of many a wild and stormy night. 

Of wind, and rain, and hail! 

It would tell of many a pleasant sound 

In the days of early fall 
When the feathered songsters flocked around — 
The bark of the fox and the rabbit's bound, 
And the heron's distant call. 

It would tell of the deafening roar 

Of the old muzzle loader's song. 
Of the eagle's scream, of the valley's roar — 
How the echoes rolled from shore to shore 

To the mouth of the Amazon. 



APPENDIX 1 1 1 

It would tell how in the morning dew 

Fell the Injun's stealthy dips, 
/\s he glided on in his light canoe. 
With the bluffs of Cold spring full in view, 

To the mouth of old Flipper creek. 

It would tell of the honk of the goose 

Above in the clear, blue sky. 
And the midnight tread of the brindle moose 
As he roams about on a forest cruise. 

And feeds in the rushes nigh. 

It would tell how from the willows near 
Comes the poacher's rifle crack — 
The bleat and bound of the stricken deer. 
As he falls on the bank in the rushes near 
With a bullet in his back. 

It would tell how his life blood ebbs away 
And how, when the wardens come 

And cruise the river up and down. 

Not a trace of the poachers found — 
Not a sight of man or gun. 

It would tell of the autos' rush and yell 
That make its old timbers squeak. 
Ten thousand things it would tell to you. 
Things that are old and things that are new. 
If that old wooden bridge could speak. 



12 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 



A Briton's Lonely Grave 

by 

S. Alonzo Day of Fairfield, Maine 

Far away in the northern pine lands. 

Those lands so like a dream, 

A lonely grave is lying 

By the banks of "Grand Lake Stream." 

That grave is the grave of a Soldier boy 

Who died long, long ago; 

He served in the ranks of Old England 

So the old Legends go. 

Long years of more than a hundred 
Have passed since that Autumn day 
When a band of Britons made their camp 
And prepared the night to stay; 
Fain would they have gone farther 
Ere that Autumn sun went down 
But this comrad true was dying — 
His life was nearly gone. ;> r;; 

Worn out by the long, hard journey. 

For they came from the distant sea, 

And he'd held his place, as a Briton does. 

In the ranks of his compemy. 

Vain was the help they gave him 

And plain could be seen that light — 

That shines from the eyes of a dying soul — 

When its spirit takes its flight. 

By the silvery stream they Imd him 

While his spirit fought its way 

From within its breaking prison 

From its earthly house of clay. 

'Twas then he called his comrads to him 

And in a voice now hard to hear 

He gave his farewell message 

For the ones he loved so dear. 



APPENDIX 113 

For them to carry back to England 
When they sailed for that fair shore 
To that home so dear now to him; 
That old home he'd see no more. 

Then he faltered for a moment, 
With a trembling voice he said, 
"Tenderly tell my dear old parents 
For I know their hearts will break 
As does a bow, when overburdened. 
When they hear of my sad fate. 
Tell them how 1 longed to see them 
As death cooled my burning brow; 
That deaths journey would be brighter 
Could I be with mother now. 

"For I was taken from my old home 
Taken by the King's command. 
As a Soldier now I'm dying — 
Dying in a foreign land." 
Then his face grew strangely brighter 
He was living far away 
With his dear ones back in England 
With a maiden fair and gay; 
Strolling with her thro' that geurden 
Where the Hawthorne roses grew. 
Just the same as on that evening 
When he took his last adieu. 

And his comrads as they listened. 
Heard him chant a sweet refrain 
With his lips now cold and lifeless. 
Heard him speak his sweetheart's name. 
As the Autumn slanting sunbeams 
Briightened up the restless stream. 
So her smiles gave to him glory 
Glory in his final dream. 
Thus he died this lad so tender, 
Hardly had his life begun; 
Thus he left his comrads weeping 



114 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

Left them with the setting sun. 
In that lonely grave they laid him 
On that eve so long ago 
While the trumpets softly sounded 
And the muffled drums beat low. 

By this grave you'll see no mourner 

(\t Memorial time of year; 

No thoughtful loving parent, 

No one to shed a tear 

Only a lonely Sumac tree 

Now marks his place of rest; 

As mother earth in her fond embrace 

Now folds him to her breast. 

Oh, Wanderer! As you peiss this grave 

1 ho' humble it may seem. 

Do not esteem it lightly 

For that simple mound doth screen 

The dust of a worthy Hero, 

A worthy Briton dead. 

Where they laid him at rest so long ago 

In his "Uniform of Red." 

Awaiting the Resurrection Day 

And on that morning bright 

He will rise and perhaps forever 

Wear a "Uniform of White." 

The tradition here recounted was told Mr. Day's father 
by the Indians. It is supposed, although upon how truthful 
a tradition is impossible to determine, that the soldier was a 
drummer boy and that he died in a war that took place be- 
fore the Revolution. The grave is about a half mile from 
the village on the east bank of the stream and is unmarked. 
A recent attempt to locate it was unsuccessful. 

Another tradition, or surmise, ascribes this grave to a 
soldier who with others may have been sent from Nova 
Scotia, by way of these lakes and carries, to the assistance 
of Burgoyne near Saratoga, New York. 



APPENDIX 115 

Indian Namies, Demons and Stories 

On a surveyor's map, made before the beginning of the 
19th century and preserved in the State House in Boston, 
Grand lake is called Witteguergaugum and Big lake Genes- 
agenagun. Governor's point on an old document preserved 
there is called Nemcass point. In answer to a letter to the 
Bureau of American Ethnology at the Smithsonian Institu- 
tion requesting information respecting these names the fol- 
lowing has been received: 

"The first, Genesagenagun (of which Genesagarumsis 
is another spelling), may probably mean pickerel lake. 

"The second name, Witteguergaugum, may mean "Mill" 
lake or pond, seemingly referring to the existence of some 
kind of a mill at this point. 

"The third may mean "fishery," if it be connected with 
namaskeak, namkeak, namkas. TTiese meanings are de- 
rived from the New England Algonquin tongues, the ac- 
cessible material of which is very meagre." 

It seems, at least, as if the meaning of Witteguergaugum 
as here given is incorrect. There was no mill near the lake 
until the tannery was begun in 1871. Many pickerel are 
found in Big lake. 

Lewis Mitchel, a member of the tribe living at Pleasant 
Point, and well versed in the history and traditions of his 
tribe, has given the following information in regard to the 
names of the two lakes: 

"Witteguergaugum, or that country called Wittiguamuk, 
or Wet-gua-you-tic- Landing Place." 

"Ktchinusangnagum (Big lake) meaning Big Elm Lake 
from the word Chesagnipk, an Elm tree." 

He also gives this little sketch of Passamaquoddy de- 
monology. 

"Wenaukmees — seen by the Indians often. They 
make curious pictures on the rocks and sand beaches." 
(These pictures are said to have been a subject of investi- 
gation by the American Bureau of Ethnology. ) 

"Kewagh — a wanderer of the Forest. These creatures 



116 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

have pieces of ice attached to their hearts. The more ice 
a Kewagh has the more powerful and wicked he is. They 
are giants. When a victim is captured he can be turned 
into a Kewagh." 

"Chepelagh, or Atwaskemkes — creatures who have two 
wings, two legs but no bodies. They wander through the 
woods with stone hatchets with which they cut down trees 
with one blow." 

"Mikemwess — creatures about the size of a five years 
old boy. They are seen by the Passamaquoddies often. 
The last one to visit Point Pleasant was seen by two Indians 
now living. The visit occurred about thirty years ago." 

The story, in the words of Lewis Mitchel is as follows: 

"Early in the 16th century, little after the Indians con- 
verted to Roman Catholic religion by De Monts missionaries, 
the Indians, after making the spring maple sugar, always 
camped at the foot of Grand lake stream to spear fish (land 
locked salmon) by torch light. One fine afternoon they 
heard an unearthly noise with piercing shrieks. Such noise 
was never, never heard by them before. They all frighten- 
ed. The old men and women said, "It is Kewagh!" 

The noise came toward the encampment very fast. 
Along toward sun down he was less than a mile to them. 
All the children and women and old people are placed in 
the canoes. The men prepared to fight. By order of some 
old man, or chief, all the bullets marked Cross and all the 
trees in front of the encampment toward the noise also 
marked Cross. Just after he turned back. He was bother- 
ed. Probably not less than fifty dogs they heard till mid- 
night. Next morning they went to the swamp and saw noth 
ing but human tracks. TTiat the only Kewagh ever visited 
Passamaquoddy. 

How genuine is the belief in these demons may be quest- 
ioned perhaps, but it is evident that at times the old, dark, 
supernatural jungle of personified Indian thoughts does 
break through the superimposed layers of Christianity and 
civilization. 

The first two of the following stories were told to Mr. 



APPENDIX 1 1 7 

Arthur Wheaton by Gabriel Tomah. They are here writ- 
ten down as well as they could be remembered after once 
hearing them. Gabriel Tomah always used the feminine pro- 
noun she instead of the masculine he. "By jolly" was a favor- 
ite expression with him, and also with many Indians who 
used to come to Grand Lake Stream The first story is a true 
account of Tomah's father's attempt to reach Hudson bay. 
"Father, she been told heap big water way off north 
west. By jolly, father, she want new hunting' ground, 
want see country. Father and two Injuns start, take guns — 
canoes, go up lake, up Penobscot, up Allegash, p:o to north- 
ern branch St. Lawrence, go on and on into v/ater no 
know, by joUy, beyond where white folks live — run in- 
to bad Injuns, but no find big water. Two Injuns heap 
'fraid, turn back; but father, she go on, she no 'fraid. Go 
on to August. She no come to big w^ater, she no find game, 
she hungry, tired, winter coming, she turn back. She go 
and go. It all new country. She no come this way. Bumbv, 
father, she come to Injuns. Injuns good, give father food. 
She tired, she go sleep in camp. In morning, by jolly 
father's clothes, they all drop off! Squaw stoal buttons 
in night; wear 'em on string round neck for ornament! 

Father came 'way, she travel; she travel long time. 
Game all gone. Father, she most starve, clothes all rags, 
no buttons, all tied on! November come. Bumby, father 
she come to river, have no canoe. She walk 'long it. Night 
come. It rain, then snow, no dry wood, nothincr to make 
fire. By jolly, father, she heap tired! She cold, clothes all 
rags, wind go through 'em, eugh! Rain go through, nothing 
to eat. Father so weak she no go m.ore. She look 'round, 
see cedar tree, bark all wet, but father, by jolly, father, she 
strip it off — heap great strips. She put some on ground, 
sit on it, draw up knees, cover all over with bark, have bior 
piece on head. She go sleep. Bumby, nine o'clock night, 
she hear sound chopping. It dark. She put out hand, 
make mark in snow in direction sound. Morning come. 
She see mark. Father stiff; she hardly move. She groan, 
try, no good. She sit on ground. Poor father! But 



118 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

bumby she try 'gain, get hold tree. She pull self up then. 
She heap cold, weak, clothes all falling off, all rags, no 
good nohow, nothing to eat; but father, she go slow like 
mark says, and bumby, by jolly, she come to lumber wagon. 
Four horses! Father, she look so bad man driving 'fraidl 
Go leave father, go back camp, tell boss. Boss know 
something, come out, look for father, find him, see what 
trouble. Boss know something. Boss take father camp; 
give clothes, give place to sleep, say to cook: "You 
burn bread little, put hot water on it, so make tea." Bumby, 
father, she wake up, then drink from burnt bread, feel bet- 
ter. Boss, she know something! Bumby give father plen- 
ty food, and by jolly, in week, father, she all right! She 
stay in camp all winter; she go down Miramichi river in 
spring with drive of logs. Then, by jolly, father, she come 
home! She been gone a year." 

The second story is one of the mystic legends in which 
the tribe delight. One day Tomah was asked what makes 
the wind blow. 

"What, white man no know that? Injun know that. 
It this way:" 

"Cloos Crumpo, she young man. The wind blow down 
lake heap plenty, by jolly! Cloos Crumpo, she had 'nough 
of it. Bumby she say to mother, Nicitoma, "Get meat. I 
go way. I find wind where she live. I settle her." So 
Nicitoma get heap meat, and Cloos Crumpo, she put it on 
back. She get in canoe, she paddle up Witteguegaugum; 
she paddle up lakes and lakes, oh heap many lakes, until, 
by jolly, she come to end! She w^alk through woods five 
days, then come to heap, big high mountain. She climb 
up, up. On top is heap big, high stone. On top stone Is 
heap, old man. She have w^hite hair, w^hite wings. She 
old man Makewind, and by jolly, how she make wind blow! 
Cloos Crumpo, she mad; she heap mad. She take old man 
Makew^ind, and throw^ down off stone. "By jolly," she 
say, "I guess we no have wind blow all time now!" 

Cloos Crumpo, she come home. She happy. 

Bumby, Injuns no like no wind. Flies bite; water mud- 



APPENDIX 119 

dy; it bad; fish no live; it hot; it smell; oh heap bad smell! 
Injuns all sick. So CloosCrumpo, she go back up lakes, go 
through woods to heap big, high mountain. She find old 
man Makewind all crumpled up at foot of heap big, high 
stone — one wing all broken. Cloos Crumpo, she get grass 
and leaves; she make paste to stick. She take off hunting 
shirt. She stick wing together and bind with shirt. Then 
she put old man Makewind on heap big, high stone again. 
Pretty soon, bumby, wind blow; rain come; flies blow 'way; 
water get clean; — get high in lake; fish live; Injuns get well. 
Everything all right! Bumby, sometimes, broken wing get 
tired. Then wind no blow; flies come; fish die; water mud- 
dy ;Injuns sick; heap smell; everything all bad! Then 
Cloos Crumpo, she go fix wing 'gain.'* 

The following stories w^ere told by members of the Passa- 
maquoddy tribe to their agent, Mr, Wallace Brown. They 
are tw^o of several told the writer in a short interview^. In 
writing them down later some details were not remembered, 
but it is hoped a few^ of the inconsistences and, in each, 
the main plot — so far as there is one — have been preserv- 
ed. Inconsistences, says Mr. Brown, are in nearly aU Indian 
stories. 

Story of the Altered Messages 

One day the chief of the tribe went hunting up in the- 
woods where Princeton now is. While he was there his 
wife gave birth to twins. There was much rejoicing in the 
tribe and the chief's father-in-law made pictures on birch 
bark which would tell him what had happened, and dis- 
patched it to the father. Hie boy entrusted with the mes- 
sage stopped at a wigwam over night for the journey was 
long. Living in the wigwam was a girl who was in love 
with the chief. In he night when the boy was asleep she 
found the piece of bark upon which was the message, and 
read it. It said: "Your wife has twins, a boy and a girl." 
She changed it by a few marks to read. "Your wife has 
twins, a pig and a dog." 

The next morning the boy continued his journey, and 



120 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

found the chief. The lattex was perturbed after he had 
exeunined the message, but he gave the boy a return 
message which read: "Keep them until I come back." 
The boy stopped at the same wigwam on the w^ay home 
and the girl, again finding his message altered it to readr 
"Kill them before I get back." 

When the father-in-law read these words he was puz- 
zled and sad, but he said that the chief must be obeyed. 
Secretly, however, he killed a doe and a young deer and 
buried them, pretending they were his daughter euid her 
children. Her he took far away in the woods, bound the 
babes to her breasts, and cut the cords of her arms. She 
and the children wandered about the woods for years. In 
the meantime the chief returned home. He was surprised 
and angry when they told hini that his wife and her child- 
ren had been killed. So his father-in-law told him what 
he had done. The chief and all of the tribe searched the 
woods for many days, but the mother and babies could not 
be found. The chief grew very sad. He wandered up and 
down in the woods a great many times. One day he w^as 
near a cave on the bank of the St. Croix where Milltown now 
is. Now it was in this cave that his wife had been hiding all 
of this time. Several years had passed. When the woman 
saw him she said to her children: 

"Go, he is your father. He is angry with us. I do 
not know why, but perhaps he will be good to you." 

So the children went out to meet their father, and tho 
mother went up on top of the cave and threw herself from 
it to the falls in the river. The falls w^ere strong and treach- 
erous, and they killed her. 

The chief saw the mbther die. He took his children up 
in his arms ,and asked them many questions about her. 
Then he took the children to the tribe. 

"Be very good to them," he said. 

He went back to the cave. He sprang to its top, and 
stood looking down into the roaring water for a long time. 
At length he too threw hin\'self into the falls and was drown- 
ed. 



APPENDIX 121 

Katahdin and Red Rose 

Once there was a girl who was called Red Rose. She 
was very beautiful. One day she wandered in the woods a 
long way from home. At length she came to a place from 
which she could see Mount Katahdin. As she looked at 
it she wished that she could have a husband as big and 
strong as the mountain. She had walked a very long way, 
and she was very tired. So whil^ she thought of the hus- 
band she would like to have she sat down by the /oot of a 
tree, and presently she fell asleep. When she awoke there 
was ani immense Indian standing before her. 

"I am the spirit of Katahdin," he said. "I know your 
wish. I have come to marry you." 

He asked her to go to the mountain with him. It was 
a very long way. 

"I cannot walk so far," she said. 

"I did not ask you to walk," he ans-wered. "I will 
carry you." 

So he sat her upon his shoulder, and went away with her 
to Katahdin. The entrance to the mountain was in its 
side between some rocks w^here it could not be easily found. 
The spirit of Katahdin took her within the mountain paist 
the rocks and there she dwelt with him most happily. 

By and by a little boy cmd a little girl were born. As 
the years passed, however. Red Rose began to grow^ home- 
sick. 

"I wish I could go home," she said one day. ' 

"You shall have your wish." answered the spirit of 
Katahdin. He gave her som^ medicine that made her 
once more young and beautiful. As a peu-ting gift he said 
that whenever the girl passed her hand over her lips her 
words should come true, and that at whatever the boy 
pointed a finger should die. 

So Red Rose went home to her tribe by the great waters 
of the Passamaquoddy bay. She took with her the little 
gr'rl and the little boy. "When they reached home it was 
a time of famine. There was nothing to eat in the wigwams; 



122 HINCKLEY TOWNSHIP 

there was no game in the woods; there were no fish in the 
bay nor in the river and lakes. Everybody was sad. Red 
Rose felt sad also, but the little girl passed her hand over 
her mouth and said that there was game in the woods. At 
once the woods were full of game. The little boy point- 
ed his finger at a deer and it fell dead. Then he pointed 
at a moose and that fell dead. He happened to point at 
an Indian and he too fell dead. The little girl passed her 
hand over her mouth and said that all the lakes and rivers 
were full of eels. Then they were full of eels, and there 
was a great deal to eat. Everybody was happy, and there 
was no more famine. 

By and by the tribe had a great fight with the MScmacks, 
the Indians to the east. The spirit of Katahdin came and 
gave to the people of Red Rose a magic bow. Arrows 
shot out from it in every direction, and every arrow killed 
an enemy. The Micmacks were frightened and fled. 
Katahdin also gave Red Rose more medicine so that every 
one hundred years she becomes young and beautiful again. 
Every one hundred years she comes back to visit the tribe, 
and she is very, very beautiful indeed. 

It is said among the Indians that many present grand- 
parents saw Red Rose when she came on the Icist century 
visit. For a long time Indians were afraid — some are still — 
to go up to the top of Mount Katahdin lest they meet the 
Spirit of the Mountain who dwells in its heart beyond the 
secret stone portals.* 



*Sonie very interesting stories told to Mr. C. C Leland by mem- 
bers of this tribe are to be found in the Century Magazine for Sept- 
eniber, 1884. 



